Las Doctoras Podcast: Recent Episodes
Las Doctoras
Today, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina close Season 4 of Las Doctoras with a conversation with two special guests!
Our first guest is Monica Simpson, queer Black activist, artist, and executive director of SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective. She takes us through her over 20 years of social justice work with a keen focus on sexual reproductive justice.
- Monica starts all of her training sessions at SisterSong with the line: We all have a story to tell. She firmly believes that stories are our fuel. They provide purpose and motivation to all of our work in social justice, whatever the cause.
- A group of Black women got together in 1994 to discuss healthcare reform for underrepresented communities, and the term they eventually came up with was reproductive justice, which is defined as “the human rights of bodily autonomy”. It’s very much intersectional, and encompasses our right to the children we want in the ways we want, to prevent or end shameful pregnancies and replace them with those of dignity.
- Community and care are at the heart of the SisterSong movement. Monica talks about their upcoming Let’s Talk About Sex Conference in Dallas, Texas, at which the topic of conversation is the blueprint for body revolution. We're all so eager to start revolutionary work from so many different angles. Monica encourages us to slow down because, the truth is, it all starts with our first environment—our own body!
Our second guest is Marsha Jones, Founder and Executive Director at The Afiya Center, which was established in response to the increasing disparities between HIV incidences worldwide and the extraordinary prevalence of HIV among Black women and girls in Texas. TAC is unique in that it is the only Reproductive Justice (RJ) organization in North Texas founded and directed by Black women.
- Having grown up in an old-school religious environment, Marsha had a lot of paradigms to shift when she came into her work. Her first step as she entered this fight concerning HIV was to center her work around social justice and human rights. She learned that, “It is these systems of oppression that drive HIV among Black women, not who we have sex with and how.”
- Now that Roe v. Wade has been overturned, Marsha’s biggest fear is twofold: 1) When you start using language that is criminalizing in any way with people who are closer to the criminal justice system, there will be health and economic impacts; 2) A lack of resources for women who have experienced violent rape and have few or no options now that they are pregnant.
- Voting is important, but it’s not the only thing we can (or should) do. We need more people to talk about this crucial issue, and to look at it from a reproductive lens to tell the entire story—the entire experience. Aside from the obvious health challenges faced by women with unwanted pregnancies, there are dangers of them losing their jobs or even their homes, especially if they live in an abusive household.
- There are so many layers to this issue. Reproductive justice allows us to talk about factors which go beyond abortion. It is important, but is just one of many other pieces of the puzzle of reproductive justice!
Connect with Monica Simpson:
Visit the SisterSong website: www.sistersong.net
Join us at the upcoming Let’s Talk About Sex Conference: www.letstalkaboutsexconference.com
Follow Monica on Instagram: www.instagram.com/artivistmonicaraye
Connect with Marsha Jones:
Visit The Afiya Center website: www.theafiyacenter.org
Follow The Afiya Center on Instagram: www.instagram.com/theafiyacenter
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Today, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina take the opportunity to analyze their Human Design Charts with life coach Elyse Preston, the founder of Be More Connected. Listen in as our hosts—both Emotional Generators—learn more about themselves and each other through this unique window into the soul!
- When you look at a Human Design Chart, you’re essentially looking at a map—a blueprint mapping out the strengths, gifts, and essences that your soul chose to support you in tapping into your highest potential. The areas filled with color are the qualities which are innate to you: the things that your soul specifically chose. The open, white spaces are those qualities which you are more susceptible to conditioning from the outside world.
- Your Energy Type is your biggest and broadest category of energy. It’s important for us to know our Type because it’s our relationship with how we’re most optimally designed to exchange energy with the world around us.
- There are nine Centers in Human Design: Head (inspiration), Anja (awareness and conceptualization), Throat (manifestation via speaking and doing), G (self, love, and direction), Heart (ego and willpower), Spleen (immune system and intuition), Solar Plexus (emotional wave), Sacral (life force and sexuality), and Root (adrenaline and stress).
- The difference between a Gate and a Channel is: A gate is a reflection of a particular energy that is coming out of one of the energy centers. Two open gates make way for that circuitry which blends two different energies together.
Everyone is on their own healing journey. To intellectualize the journey is one thing; but, to embody it is another. In fact, to authentically share the process can be healing in itself. Understanding the language of Human Design gives you the tools to validate your experiences, and even embrace all of those experiences—whether you previously perceived them as “good” or “bad”—as assets rather than as flaws.
Connect with Elyse Preston:
Visit her website: www.elysepreston.com
Follow her on Instagram: www.instagram.com/iamelysepreston
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Today, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina sit down with friend, political advocate, and fellow teacher Anna Lily. The three share an inspiring message of change and daily action, encouraging us to go beyond visualizing a utopian future and start creating a system of liberation today.
- To kick things off, Dr. Renee, Dr. Cristina, and Anna Lily go through a lightning round of fun questions around how they would do things if they were President. The questions include: “Who would you have on to sing the National Anthem?”, “Which book would you swear on at your inauguration?”, “Who would be your poet laureate?”, “What is the main theme of your inaugural speech?”, “Who would you name as your cabinet members?”, “Who would be your presidential bruja?”, and, “Who would be your presidential fashion designer/stylist?”
- After the rapid-fire questions, Anna Lily talks about her upbringing—being raised in a family of evangelical conservatives—and how Trump’s election became the turning point for her political convictions, inspiring her to campaign heavily on the ground for Joe Biden.
- Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina assure Anna Lily that she isn’t a “coward” for stopping herself from having political conversations with family members whose beliefs don’t match hers. The three then discuss how to set boundaries and discern the line between having such conversations and keeping politics off the table when it comes to both family and friends.
- Finally, Anna Lily and our co-hosts attempt to predict what to expect for the rest of the year when it comes to Joe Biden’s presidency.
While politics is obviously important, Dr. Renee, Dr. Cristina, and Anna Lily believe that change starts in our own neighborhood. We need to ask ourselves: How do we hold our politicians accountable after leaving the voting booth? And of course, how do we show up in our own communities? We’re a long way off from a truly liberated America—but as with any big vision for change, it all starts with us.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Today, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina sit down with their good friend and former student Bernice to discuss Mariposa de Barrio, the telenovela based on the life of Jenni Rivera.
- One of the most striking parts of Jenni’s story is the fact that she built a career in a man’s industry. She is a true trailblazer who single-handedly made other women who are fans of Banda—a male-dominated music genre—feel validated.
- There is a surprising amount of domestic and sexual violence depicted in the telenovela, without trigger warnings nor a narrative that outright condemns these scenes. Our hosts dissect this concerning direction the show takes by touching on old-fashioned family dynamics, addressing the behavior of the male and female characters in particular.
- Jenni Rivera’s public image projects confidence and total dominance, yet, as Mariposa de Barrio shows, behind closed doors she constantly struggled to find her voice even in her personal life. She was regularly silenced and forced to feel minimized, and found true liberation whenever she was onstage. Yet, as our hosts know, Jenni experienced a lot of joy in her life as well. They bemoan the “tragedy porn” that the show seems to glorify.
- Finally, our hosts urge against the normalization and, worse, the romanticization of the many depictions of toxic relationships which rear their heads in the show.
From the normalization of machismo to women marrying for survival, Mariposa de Barrio illustrates—in 91 episodes—that the patriarchy is alive and well. But our saving grace and hope for a better future rests in having conversations that highlight these common yet often-overlooked issues in our own lives. Through the example of great women like Jenni Rivera, we can take those first steps to creating a more equal society that we’ll have full confidence letting our kids grow up in.
Connect with Las Doctoras
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Enroll on our Sacred Writing Course: https://lasdoctoras.net/sacredwriting
Today, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina sit down with money coach Nathalia, known to most as @mom_money_boss on Instagram to talk all things money and financial freedom.
- From budgetingto generational wealth, Nathalia wants to be a powerful voice in her community, many members of which lack the mentorship and resources to grow their money mindset and leave a legacy to their family. This hits especially close to home for her as she also had only recently been on a journey to pay down her student loan and $18,000 of consumer debt.
- “A budget doesn’t mean deprivation,” says Nathalia. You can still live a great life while having boundaries around your spending. It all starts with setting your goals and priorities, then slowly eliminating the things that don’t serve those goals and priorities
- Everyone is on a different stage of the money mindset journey. You have to meet yourself where you are. We all have our own unique money triggers that can be traced back to the way we were raised. Uncover those money memories and really try to pinpoint the emotions that you tie to those memories. That is the first step to untangling your identity from those memories and forging a better financial future for yourself.
- Finally, despite her impressive grasp of the world of finance and investing as a whole, Nathalia wishes to understand how colonization, patriarchy, and the like have an impact on the relationship that many minorities have with money.
“I’m very conscious of the fact that we’re not on a level playing field,” says Natalia. From creating an emergency fund, to opening an IRA, to navigating taxes, to investing in real estate, Nathalia hopes that, through the Mom Money Boss brand, she will be able to make a positive impact on the wider community.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Enroll on our Sacred Writing Course: https://lasdoctoras.net/sacredwriting
Creativity. It’s a huge part of our lives, and one that Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina believe we all need to have more conversations around. Today, the two specifically zoom into priming our entire being to embody creative states. Believing that creativity requires everything in us—body, mind, and soul—in order for us to express it fully, Las Doctoras encourage us to see creativity as a holistic process that is just as powerful as a tool for meditation as it is a tool for productivity.
- Most of us think of creativity as a completely heady, utilitarian process. But if we allow creativity to stay in our heads, we experience those “blocks” and, eventually, burnout. We need to learn to step back and create ceremony around our work instead of obsessing over the actual doing of that work. Before writing, Las Doctoras like to meditate or simply move their bodies as a “warmup”, paving the way for flow.
- We decolonize our writing as we learn to step back and stop treating ourselves like a well-oiled machine every second of every day. This helps us release old messages and step into a new way of being.
- Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina used to take artwork for granted. Understandably, our go-go-go culture conditioned us into thinking that art is a waste of time. They found, however, that doing art allows them to focus, integrate, and process. In fact, the growth they experience from doing art positively influences their work!
- Finally, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina invite us to name our process. Admit and embrace the fact that you need more space to doodle, more space to dance, more space to relax, so that you can get those creative juices to flow easier.
We need to create spaces for us to create, to dream, to visualize. We need to stop thinking of these activities as things we’re only supposed to do during our “downtime”, or on the weekend. Ultimately, once we embrace our process, life—including work—not only becomes so much more fun, but so much more fulfilling. And what’s more important than that?
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Enroll on our Sacred Writing Course: https://lasdoctoras.net/sacredwriting
Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina sit down with CPA Benjamin Perez (@perezadvisor on Instagram) to touch on his evolving views on masculinity, both within himself and among the Latino community as a whole.
- Benjamin considers the various aspects of the complex topic that is masculinity from the point of view of his lived experience, particularly as a Latino. He breaks down the old beliefs that he had to overcome such as traditional machismo and gender roles.
- Speaking of unlearning, Benjamin talks about toxic masculinity and how he had to deal with it both as a victim of its destructive nature, and as a perpetrator himself. He explains that it is especially tough experiencing this toxicity within his own family and that, to this day, he is undergoing the process of decolonization, not only emotionally and mentally, but physically and spiritually as well.
- After Benjamin’s eyes were finally opened in college when he began to unpack his story while studying disenfranchised groups, the hard part really began: facing his traditional-minded family. He says that he’s the type to call out BS when he sees it, and the empowered Benjamin was willing and able to express his new views. But he had to learn to nip ego in the bud and pick his battles—especially considering it was his own family that he was having these tough conversations with.
- Finally, Benjamin gives his thoughts on becoming a father in the near future and how he aims to use more appropriate language than what he was raised with when speaking to his children, especially if he were to have sons. More importantly, he intends to model the behaviors he wants them to internalize. For instance, Benjamin won’t just preach the virtues of vulnerability, but won’t hesitate to display vulnerability in front of his kids.
Ultimately, Benjamin has come away embracing vulnerability, and he’s happy to report that it’s rubbed off on some of his own family members who have been entrenched in the traditional culture of toxic masculinity all their lives.
Our hosts conclude: “Patriarchy harms boys and men as it harms girls and women.” Without a doubt, one of the biggest takeaways of our conversation is the importance of practicing what we preach. By living out healthy masculinity, we overcome its toxic counterpart through sheer example.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Welcome to the 40th episode of Las Doctoras! Today’s topic (and one which Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina will continue to unpack in the next few episodes) is masculinity. Being mothers to young boys, this is an especially personal topic for the two. Listen in as they share how they intend to help their sons navigate a culture where toxic masculinity continues to prevail, as well as how they define the healthy sort of masculinity that they hope their sons can embody growing up.
- Our hosts reflect on how their parents and grandparents exhibited toxic masculinity in their own unique ways. Having grown up during tough times, that previous generation exercised a lot of that aggression and emotional suppression characteristic of unhealthy masculinity.
- Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina explain how they had to unlearn a lot of what they were brought up with in order to be vulnerable. They speak on their identity struggles as tomboys in high school. Dr. Renee in particular talks about how she grew up “boy crazy”, probably as a way to attempt to validate her femininity, which at the time she thought can only happen via the approval of boys or men.
- Because society glamorizes toxic masculinity, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina believed for the longest time that they had to behave like men to be successful. This attitude, they say (speaking from experience) leads to burnout. That’s made even worse by the fact that our capitalist society eggs us on to perform beyond our limits.
- Because our hosts are intimately familiar with the destructive power of toxic masculinity, they’re determined to ensure their sons don’t end up buying into it as the “ideal” it’s advertised as.
- Finally, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina invite us to redefine “masculinity” by removing the social constructs around the term in order to pave the way for healthy masculinity.
Masculinity, in and of itself, is not toxic. It becomes toxic because of a patriarchal society. There are beautiful things about femininity as there are about masculinity. The key is to erase social constructs around the terms, just as “fatness” becomes a neutral word if we stop equating it to “ugliness”. Once we acknowledge that, we begin to usher in true, healthy masculinity.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina continue their discussion on the state of academia and attempt to pull back the curtain behind its hierarchical structure, based on their personal experiences in this world.
Today’s guest, Dr. Ana Linda Arellano Nez, first met our hosts through their writing course and today works as the copy editor for Saint Lunita magazine alongside being an ethnic studies professor at California State University, Fullerton.
- Our hosts and Dr. Ana Linda reflect on their search for home in academia, being the first in their respective families to go through higher education, not to mention the mental exhaustion and lack of recognition that being an adjunct university professor comes with, particularly in California.
- Dr. Ana Linda shares her experience as an adjunct professor and her search for tenured positions. She chats about her love for teaching and why she had always been completely at home in classrooms and libraries. She also discusses the reality that expectant mothers experience in academia.
- Dr. Renee explains that “capitalism is exploitation. Academia is capitalism. Therefore, academia is going to be exploitative at all levels, particularly for adjuncts with no stability.”
- Finally, it’s always important to remember that life is worth more than our career. We shouldn’t be forced to burnout or settle for a lower salary than we deserve. It’s important to call out the exploitation present in academia in order for adjunct professors to start seeing real change and thrive while doing the work they’re so passionate about.
Dr. Renee, Dr. Cristina, and Dr. Ana Linda break down the many issues with the university system in California, particularly as it pertains to adjunct professors like themselves.
While they absolutely love their work as teachers, the rampant exploitation and underappreciaton of adjuncts is a huge systemic problem. For instance, being a mom shouldn’t be something that you have to hide just because it doesn’t make you as “desirable” a candidate.
Las Doctoras hopes that their conversations become catalysts for transformation and grace in the world of academia for the sake of all future Women of Color looking for careers in the university system.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Today, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina sit down with Diane Nevarez, a professor in the Education department at University of California Irvine. They do a deep dive into the current state of academia with a focus on the many challenges that the American university system poses, both in general and specifically around the pandemic.
- There is a lot of exploitation that takes place among adjunct professors precisely due to the contractual or part-time nature of the job. The hiring process is toxic and an air of uncertainty permeates the period in between classes. “I love what I do,” says Dr. Renee, “but I deserve to get paid more.”
- Elitism continues to characterize the culture of academia, particularly when it comes to state schools. A CV that has Cal State on it isn’t as respected as one that mentions USC or Stanford or another “prestigious” school.
- As a form of resistance, Diane once talked to her students about being pregnant while teaching. That was because, if faculty or students at USC were pregnant, there was an unspoken agreement to basically disappear until they were no longer pregnant. Unfortunately, this is a reality even in the ethnic studies department.
- “Spring 2020 should have been cancelled,” says Dr. Renee. She and her fellow professors had no choice but to move their courses from in-person to online in under a week—not to mention they were expected to be “experts” right away at teaching classes online. And now, a speedy transition back to in-person classes is underway even as many students are still unprepared or unwilling to go out in public.
- Boundaries matter a lot if you’re in academia. The emotional ups-and-downs of today’s educational environment on adjunct professors directly affect their family life; so, it’s more important than ever to set expectations for yourself, even if it means bracing yourself to receive only 50% of your usual salary.
- Finally, Diane believes that building unity between other professors that look like her, along with celebrating spaces of love and resistance is the first step to seeing real change in academia.
Dr. Renee said it best: “My loyalty does not lie with any university or any department. My loyalty is to my students.” She, Dr. Cristina, and Diane have nothing but passion for their work as professors. At the same time, they bear the exploitation that the job comes with. They hope to change the entire landscape through their example and their resistance, especially as racial minorities in a predominantly white space. “What we’re doing,” says Dr. Cristina, “is radical in and of itself—just being there.”
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
As we approach Día de los Muertos, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina revisit the topic of grief and loss by speaking on their personal experiences loosing the people closest to them.
- Dr. Renee reflects on her father’s death seven years later. From his final request (“If anything happens, write the book.”), to the chaos of having countless long-lost relatives flying in once it was clear the situation was grim, to the moment Dr. Renee realized that it was time to let him go nine days after being admitted to the hospital.
- The time came for them to finally let her father go. But the real circus had not even begun. Dr. Renee remembers having to choose a mortuary and call up relatives from Mexico to give them the update—and at some point throwing her phone against the wall in exasperation. She and her family decided to go off-grid for a short time at the Griffith Observatory until their first meeting at the mortuary… on Thanksgiving morning.
- During the final viewing, Dr. Renee recalls the interesting mishmash of visitors, from even more long-lost relatives, to her dad’s entire over-60 soccer team, to a squad of cop cars pulling up outside the building belonging to his colleagues from the police department.
- Dr. Renee confesses that she had no idea how to put her father’s ashes in the urn. It was a hilariously dark scene involving a hasty display of siphoning, bits of bone, and her mother having to sweep some of the ashes off the kitchen counter. “My dad would have wanted us to laugh,” Dr. Renee says of that moment.
- Dr. Renee shares that it was only after Santos was born months later that she was really able to begin her grief journey.
- Finally, Dr. Cristina talks about her own experience losing her papá and abuela and reiterates the importance of celebration and showing up.
We need to destigmatize death and the grief that follows so that we allow ourselves to feel a full spectrum of emotions that, in turn, helps us further appreciate the completely natural—and supernatural—cycle of life and death. Dr. Cristina reminds us that our beloved dead are with us in a deeper way than they ever were in bodily form. Letting ourselves live the entirety of that experience of loss—which includes celebration—is the only way we truly appreciate that reality.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina welcome Tida Beattie, a 1st generation Thai-American end-of-life doula, community educator, and grief activist; and Soyeon Davis is a 1.5 generation Korean-American end of life doula. Tida and Soyeon are the co-founders of MESO, which provides advocacy, assistance, and support to immigrant families dealing with chronic illness and/or aging.
- Much of Tida and Soyeon’s work at Meso is a product of their lived experience. Having lost many family members of their own and discovering the lack of support for underserved and marginalized communities, the two were inspired to fill this shocking gap in American society by creating an exclusive space for their people.
- Those in minority communities are culture bearers. It’s so easy for Asian-American to become disconnected from their cultural roots, especially because of systemic silencing alongside the fact that they often lack role models. Tida shares why it is vital to reclaim one’s rituals, practices, and beliefs that their ancestors have held onto before them.
- Soyeon talks liminal space and shares her complex (but common) experience of being othered not just in America but in her native Korea as well. It is our responsibility, she says, to accept and embrace this grief, but then to reconcile with it in order to not pass it on to the next generation.
- Finally, Tida and Soyeon explain their day-to-day work as life doulas and why they believe they serve as role models to the people they work with.
Ultimately, as life doulas to the underserved and marginalized, Tida and Soyeon are role models to the individuals they serve. They encourage us not to suppress or hide from our grief, but to address it head-on. By destigmatizing these conversations, we rediscover our heritage and kickstart the process of healing not just for ourselves, but for the future generations.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Listen on Apple Itunes
Connect with MESO:
Follow MESO on Instagram: www.instagram.com/mesocommunity
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Learn more Today, we welcome Chicana novelist, poet, playwright, and independent scholar Ana Castillo who has been at the forefront of publishing works on the socio-political realities of the Chicana experience, including race and gender issues, since the 1970s.
- Ana reflects on the timeless impact of her work and recalls with great joy how fans would reignite that fire within her whenever they approach her to share how Massacre of the Dreamers, The Mixquiahuala Letters, and her other works inspired them.
- “It’s always a risk,” says Ana, referring to her spontaneous approach to writing her books. She talks about how she and women who look like her serve as her greatest inspiration for each and every single one of her works.
- Ana speaks on how she digs deep to be able to write from different perspectives (ex. her own son, an Amazonian chief, etc.) for different genres, particularly when it comes to memoirs and poetry.
- Ana recounts a particularly notable experience reading a poem for an African American woman during her inauguration as the new president of the state university she graduated from.
- One of our members asks Ana: “Is it easier to write about lesbianism in Spanish versus in English?”
- An immigration attorney specializing in asylum cases explains how writing legal briefs is often heart-wrenching work. She asks Ana how she is able to navigate the difficulty of writing heavy material.
- Finally, Ana is asked, “Who [exactly] is the dead?” in the Book of the Dead.
“What I write,” says Ana, “whether it’s poetry, nonfiction, or a novel really comes from what I need to write at that time.” More specifically, she writes for women who look like her, at any point in time she is inspired to pen a new book. She hopes that, through her work, she continues to honor the Chicana experience.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Listen on Apple Itunes
Season 4 has arrived! Dr. Renne and Dr. Cristina are rested and ready to launch into a new phase of the podcast and, of course, the community.
- Having returned from their well-deserved rest in July, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina are raring to get back into action! But not before thanking the community, whether through the podcast, book club, writing course, or magazine. So much opportunity came out of this supportive and encouraging family, and the ladies are forever grateful!
- Speaking of the book club, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina got a shoutout from FIERCE by mitú, who named them as part of their list of “Top 8 Latinx Book Clubs”. As their influence grows, they want to be able to use their platform to support Latino-owned businesses.
- September is a big month! Listen in as Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina give updates on the magazine coming out on the 22nd, their upcoming retreat, and the month-end launch of their new sacred writing course.
- Parenthood is such a vulnerable calling and forced Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina to tap even deeper into their spirituality than they ever had before having kids. They dive deep into how they aim to raise their kids in the new normal.
- Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina prepare to explore the complexities of masculinity, gender, and sex—the good, the bad, and the ugly.
- Finally, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina dissect what it means to claim the identity of bruja during a time when shamanism and spirituality are all the rage, commercialized, and at risk of being infected by the vestiges of colonization.
While today’s conversation marks new beginnings, it was also an “unpacking” for Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina: parenthood, race, sex, gender, capitalism, colonization—there is still much work to be done in navigating these tricky topics; but, it’s crucial to keep exploring them in-depth as we move forward into the new normal.
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
Enroll in our Sacred Writing Course: https://lasdoctoras.net/sacredwriting
This episode is centered around rest. “Rest” is not usually something you find on someone’s list of things to celebrate, but Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina sit down to discuss exactly why the right amounts of rest, in the truest sense of the word, helps us move forward stronger and wiser with a renewed sense of purpose.
● Rest is something that helps us recover with more vigor to do the most important things in our lives. Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina note that capitalism always pushes us to rush and “strike while the iron is hot”; but, if we move without enough energy to actually do things effectively, what’s the point?
● It helps to create space in the calendar for rest. After all, if we’re using our sacred writing time to prepare for creation, rest factors into that process just as vitally as every other important activity that we schedule.
● There has been so much upheaval in the past year-and-a-half. Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina reflect on what Las Doctoras means to them. “Ultimately,” says Dr. Cristina, “the work we’re doing with Las Doctoras is about being able to live our lives according to our principles.”
● Rest is not “the cherry on top” of your day—it is the base of the cake! How do you build anything on a weak or shaky foundation?
● If celebration is revolution, when we celebrate rest, we take a stance against white supremacy, capitalism, and the patriarchy, who want us to go, go, go; who see us as just part of the machine. Let’s throw a wrench in the machine known as oppression by celebrating rest!
● “Lazy” is a social construct. Laziness doesn’t actually exist. What does that word even mean? Do you lack motivation? Then why not ask why you’re lacking it and find a way to get it! Get to the root of the issue and solve it instead of hiding behind the word “lazy”!
Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina are inviting you, today, to veg out.
Rest comes in more forms than simply sleep. Whenever we relax our minds—whether by taking a walk in nature or sitting on the couch watching Netflix—we are engaging in an activity that will refresh, recharge, and revitalize us for the tasks ahead.
What’s your favorite way to engage in that wonderful activity we call “rest”?
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
This episode is centered around home. Whether an actual physical home or a community that makes you feel at home Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina touch on how to find your place of belonging, operate from a place of abundance, and do your part to build a world free of injustice by becoming more conscious of how you raise the next generation.
● Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina kick off this episode by sharing the importance of setting aside time and energy to recharge and refill your creative tank and nurture your spiritual life. They share how they do this through writing and the success their clients have had via their one-on-one sessions. If you’re interested in enrolling in the Sacred Writing Course, you can join the waitlist and hold your spot for the Fall session by sending an email to: lasdoctorasonline@gmail.com
● Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina are ramping up to release the summer issue of their magazine, Saint Lunita! Visit the magazine here: www.saintlunita.com
● There has been so much upheaval in the past year-and-a-half. Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina reflect on what Las Doctoras means to them. “Ultimately,” says Dr. Cristina, “the work we’re doing with Las Doctoras is about being able to live our lives according to our principles.”
● Creating systemic change is possible if we make it a point to give from overflow into the people and communities we love and believe deserve better opportunities to rise in society. Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina share how they’ve tried to be more conscious about redistributing their own growing resources to those who need them most, including hiring more women of color.
● Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina talk alternative homes and the unfortunate reality of having so many barriers we have to overcome just to buy a place to live in.
● Your children’s school is their second home. Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina explain just how important it is for them to find a learning environment where their kids are accepted, loved, and feel safe in. They also reflect on their own experience in school and their goal to ensure their kids never have to grow up being forced to abandon parts of who they are.
● Capitalism, toxic masculinity, patriarchy, sexism, racism, and white-washing. There is still a lot of work to do, but Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina reassure us that every single person can make lasting change in their own household.
In spite of our shared adversity in the past year, and in spite of the sheer amount of division and vitriol still plaguing the country today, Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina find hope in the fact that more people than ever are speaking up.
“We know what we need to know to make some change in this generation and we are not going to not do that. We’re going to step into the empowerment of creating the safety and security we never had as children.”
It starts with our own families, in our own homes. If you have children, the one thing you can do to make an impact is to nurture an environment that loves the child, that encourages them to simply be their full selves. By empowering the next generation, parents everywhere can create a ripple effect that can eliminate the many systemic issues that continue to exist in 2021.
How are you building the safe place you call “home”?
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
This episode is all about celebration! Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina have a lot to celebrate, so join them in shining light on jaw-dropping achievements, exciting news, and new opportunities for growth and connection.
- Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina kick off this episode by celebrating the sold out Sacred Writing Course and all that it has created for them and their community. In creating the spaces they need for themselves, they’ve held space for so many amazing women to connect to the sacredness of writing, express their creativity, feel empowered, and heal. If you’re interested in enrolling in the Sacred Writing Course, you can join the waitlist and hold your spot for the Fall session by sending an email to: lasdoctorasonline@gmail.com
- Something else Dr. Renee and Dr. Cristina are celebrating is their magazine, Saint Lunita! With all the support and investment they’ve received, they feel like they have created an incredible community hub with all types of powerful contributions, including art, essays, book reviews, and ancestral messages. This is truly a childhood dream come true! Visit the magazine here: www.saintlunita.com
- Calling all CPAs, tax preparers, and lawyers! As Las Doctoras grows and expands, they’re looking for more people to join their team. If you’d like to offer your services, shoot them an email!
- Dr. Cristina received the 2021 Catherine H. Jacobs Outstanding Faculty Lecturer Award at CSUDH! We’re hoping she uses the prize money to treat herself to something nice…
- Dr. Renee reads and reflects upon the incredible review she received from the Women & Gender Studies department at Cal State. The work she does is who she is and it’s making an international impact. “To be seen by our departments, by our universities, for the work that we do… it’s just beyond,” she says.
- Dr. Renee bought a house!! This is also a childhood dream come true and it means so much to her. Even though it was an emotional rollercoaster, she says, “The reason I was able to do it was because I didn’t have to pay my loan for a whole year.” That’s one result of the pandemic that’s worth celebration!
- Dr. Cristina’s son will be going to a forest school! This is a major mom win for her, even though not everyone is super supportive of it…
With all of these milestones being reached, what has come up for them is that it’s not always easy for family and friends to be 100% supportive of their decisions and achievements. “It’s kind of coming back to what we were talking about before, like why we weren’t always sharing our podcasts. There’s this sense of legitimacy, like, “What is legitimate success?”… I think we are very much creating our own idea and version of success.”
If we operate from a scarcity mindset or a mindset of being unsafe, it can be difficult to celebrate even the biggest wins in life, especially other people’s wins. If we can celebrate ourselves and each other, we can lift each other up and feel safety and joy more often.
Don’t wait for the other shoe to drop. Shine light on the false narratives and stories you’re telling yourself that aren’t serving you so that you can move beyond them.
You deserve to see your childhood dreams come true just because you exist. You have a right to celebration. You have a right to feel successful. Other people’s ideas of success and celebration may be different than yours, but if you want to celebrate, go ahead and celebrate! Have the audacity to pursue your dreams, break the systems, change the f*cking world, and relish in it.
“For us, it is unpacking a lot of this stuff so that we can sit in the celebration and be present with it.”
What do you want to celebrate today?
Connect with Las Doctoras:
Visit their website: www.lasdoctoras.net
Follow them on Instagram: www.instagram.com/las.doctoras
We’re celebrating 30 episodes with a special discussion about motherhood in the patriarchy. We’ll examine our own personal experiences with parenting and the emotional labor and expectations handed to women and femmes in a male-dominated society.
1:58 Announcing our latest “Writing to our Ancestors” course with a new series called “Sacred Writing.” Learn more about it here.
4:12 Launching our online magazine! Watch a Chisme Session with editor Selisa here.
7:58 Decolonizing Catholicism.
14:48 The unconscious expectations husbands put on their wives in motherhood.
24:30 The colonized and colonizer relationship. Navigating he patriarchy and dismantling white supremacy from a stance of intersectionality.
41:32 Rest as a birthright.
In this episode, we discuss our own sexual journeys and the fluidity of sexuality as we age particularly as it relates to our sexual preferences. Join us for a a very raw conversation about sexuality, gender binaries and intimacy.
We are inviting Norma back onto the show. She previously came onto the show to talk about her article on colorism in the family. Norma is a first-generation American and a Sagittarius. She is an attorney by trade and she started to write during her time as a stay at home mom. She was driven by a mission to share the stories of brown women raising their children.
After she published an article in the New York Times she started thinking about the power of representing her community through story, so she is starting a LatinX focused publishing house. In this episode, we discuss steps that we can take to cultivate better quality representation of LatinX stories and how to work through challenges the system presents to this mission.
15:02 - Reflections on 2020 as a year
24:00 - Cultivating quality representation of the LatinX community by building our own platform
34:55 - How the industry gatekeeper are silencing so many voices
40:23 - Stories being silenced before the writing process even begins
45:05 - Norma’s vision for her publishing house and her overall work
47:13 - How community can support the creation of new infrastructures that work for everyone
Links
Norma’s previous appearance on the show
Fabian Florez Publishing Website
In this episode, we interview Esoteric Esa, an astrologer, numerologist, and creator of an oracle deck. We are doing a reading with her. We have each recently had individual readings with her, and today we are getting a deeper insight into the soul work we do together.
We are getting a synastry reading, meaning that we are having our two charts compared to each other. Esa does this for couples, business partners, friends, and any two people who want a deeper understanding of their relationship.
In This Episode:
18:03 - Our team style as the doer and the dreamer
25:00 - The fifth house connections and how they strengthen our friendship
31:14 - Diving into our shared Chiron sign
40:20 - Our shared midheaven placement and what that means for our shared professional life
49:00 - A brief forecast of the upcoming year
Resources Mentioned
Writing Course starts on Jan 31
Esoteric Esa’s podcast, Patreon, and Oracle Deck
Book a Reading With Esoteric Esa
Follow Esoteric Esa on IG @esoteric_esa
Follow the work of Oracle Deck co-conributor: Marlha Sanchez
Follow our work Semillas de las Abuelas
Aida Salazar is a writer and arts activist. She is a mother, and she has been writing for children. She recently published The Moon Within about a young girl who is about to get her first period. She also just published a book called Land of the Cranes, about a 9-year-old child who experiences being an undocumented immigrant. We discovered Aida through our book club. We read The Moon Within, and Christina uses it in her class.
In our interview today, we talk about the challenges and gifts of doing decolonizing work through the writing and publishing of children’s books.
10:00 - Decolonizing and appropriation in the publishing world
14:51 - Writing a novel in verse to talk about deep topics
17:02 - Aida’s opinion on American Dirt and what it means for other authors with books about immigrants
26:54 - “We have to stand in our dignity and the work and authenticity that we bring to the table.”
28:43 - Challenges that came with publishing The Moon Within
46:16 - Reframing womanhood and its relationship to the moon
Links
Aida’s website
Booklandia
bookshop.org
We are talking about spirituality today. We have discussed spirituality in the past, and we see that spirituality is often defined within the context of religion or white supremacy. As we go on the journey of finding our own spiritual grounding we are recognizing that our practices are a part of our journey in reclaiming what was lost through colonization. What saves us from whitewashing and white supremacy is the spiritual connection we have with our ancestors.
We also have all kinds of healers and spiritual practitioners in our community and we’ve each had our own experiences encountering magic.
16:21 - Discussing our natal chart readings and our experience with astrology
18:47 - Academia vs spirituality and how astronomy and astrology are one and the same
25:50 - Coming to terms with psychic abilities in ourselves and our ancestors and confronting our discomfort using that word
31:28 - Reclaiming our gifts from patriarchal, Christian guilt
39:21 - What it really means to heal your ancestors
44:35 - Main takeaways from our natal chart readings
Resources Mentioned
Esoteric Esa -Esoteric Homegirl
Karissa M Raya - Reiki Practitioner and Photographer
Melodia - Zumba and Meditation
Latinx Parenting - Nonviolent Parenting
We went on a retreat away from our families. There was tequila, self-love, and lots of laughs. We hadn’t seen each other in person for months because of COVID after being used to seeing each other every day. So it was so beautiful to come together and share this experience with each other.
In this episode, we talk about our experience on the retreat, and some reflections on how taking time away from our families redefines motherhood, moving away from capitalist, patriarchal narratives into something more healthy for ourselves and our families.
In This Episode :
8:04 - The format of our retreat working with Silvia Boreo
13:00 - The inner-bonding methodology that Silvia uses in her retreat holding space for Latinx communities
16:27 - Different aspects of the self you can connect with using inner-bonding
18:00 - Breaking through the negative stories we tell ourselves and finding the truth
21:09 - Redefining motherhood, moving away from patriarchal and capitalist conditioning around parenthood
34:07 - Raising anti-capitalist, empathetic, and compassionate children while still living in a supremacist and capitalist world
45:37 - Creating a safe space to feel together and cry together
49:10 - Decolonizing healing and creating community
1:04:46 - Conversations we plan on having in future episodes
Resources Mentioned
Woman Who Glows In The Dark
Nannies, Sex Workers, and Maids
Marla Sanchez - Decolonizing Homeschooling
Latina Mothers Collaborative
It Feels Good To Be Me
Patreon page
Las Doctoras Instagram Twitter
It is September 2020, and we are in season 3 of the podcast. We are going to kick off this new season with a chat about our lives and our future plans for the show. We start out with some updates on the beginning of the school year, thoughts on everything that has happened this summer, and some intentions we have moving forward with this next cycle. We are beginning a new phase of our work. Things are evolving, new opportunities are coming forward, and we are excited to have you along for the ride.
In This Episode:
2:17 - Reflections on the summer
5:15 - How the Tower card in the tarot can help us understand 2020
9:46 - Finding joy in the chaos as we move into autumn
17:56 - Holding space for our students and our kids through going back to school online
26:29 - Experiences with the Las Doctoras book club and our plans for autumn
40:23 - Our intentions and our spiritual growth
Resources Mentioned
Patreon page
Las Doctoras InstagramTwitter
In our last episode for our body politics series we explore the topic of fatphobia and diet culture with professor and scholar Monica Hernandez. We talk about how we often learn fatphobia in our families, and how it get perpetuated in the media, diet industry, fitness industry, and the medical industry. Monica share her personal journey with her relationship to her own body as well as her academic journey in centering her experience in her research.
In this episode we continue the conversation about body politics. We interviewed Amanda Sauceda of @guthealth.nutritionist. We explore the world of diet culture and the vicious cycle and toxic relationship to food it perpetuates. Amanda talks to us about her Mindful Gut Method which reframes nutrition from a more holistic approach. This conversation adds nuance to the larger topic of body politics and both questions the mainstream message about diet, and offers an alternative that does not rely on oppressive methods.
Resources mentioned in the episode:
Amanda’s Website
Amanda’s Free Gut Health Guide
Amanda’s Free Food Diary Template
Mindful Raisin Activity
Intutitive Eating Book recommended by Amanda
In this episode, we talk about our relationship with our bodies. Our most vulnerable discussion yet, we dig deep and uncover some childhood wounds that had a lasting impact on the ways we see our bodies and how we relate to our bodies. As always we put this in context with larger structures of oppression and all the outside impacts on our body image. This will be the first in a series of episodes covering the topic of body politics.
Here we are in all our rawness, coming to you from the middle of this pandemic. Trying to survive, to make sense of it all, to find hope, and continue our struggle for social justice, what more is there to say?
This episode hear about our updates, how we survived Mercury Retrograde, Full Moon in Pisces and illness. We are deep in our feelings, and using this platform as a therapeutic outlet. If you bear with us for about 20 minutes, then we get to the meat of our topic.
We are discussing the controversy surrounding the novel American Dirt, and it’s cultural appropriation among the many critiques of the author and the book. As always we see ourselves in dialogue with many other Latinx scholars and organic intellectuals who have spoken out on this topic including our fellow podcasters at Latino USA and Bitter Brown Femmes, as well as Myriam Gurba who’s critique of the book sparked the controversy.
Our analysis of the book lands us calling out the publishing industry, and the power systems that create a world where a white woman can receive a 7 figure advance for a story about migrants, while people of color continue to struggle for any kind of representation. This leads us to a discussion about the Super Bowl halftime show with Shakira and JLO, and the complexity of the importance of representation while also leaving space for critique and the need for growth.
Representation absolutely matters in a white supremacist, patriarchal, cisheteronortamive world that marginalizes so many. We ask how can representation and critique work alongside each other? And it only means we need more representation to fully illustrate the complexity of our experiences.
We are glad to see shows like Genetfied, Vida and Expanding Universe of Ashley Garcia are doing just that, and we implore the entertainment industry, the publishing industry to be intentional in giving marginalized people opportunities to tell their stories.
Be sure to listen, subscribe, and review on iTunes, Spotify and Google Play.
“Popular culture constitutes a terrain where not only are ethnic and racialized, as well as gender, identity contested, reproduced, and transformed, but also the struggle for and against social equality is engaged.”- Michelle Habell-Pallan
In this episode we talk with Leslie Arreola Hillenbrand and Lizeth Toscano of Latinx Parenting. Our conversation brought up so many topics including generational trauma, mother wounds, gender roles and more. We shared with our guests what their work has helped us to heal, create more conscious approaches with our children and our own parents that take into consideration our cultural values and the systemic power dynamics at play.
Our main takeaway from our conversation: Parenting with nonviolence creates a modality by which we can begin to see children as full human beings that need our love, compassion and guidance to see their full potential as individuals and equals. As Lizeth points out parenting models rooted in domination and violence come from colonization, “they don’t come from inherent goodness of our ancestry. Peaceful parenting was ours at one point. Because of slavery and racism our parents had to adapt to a cruel and hard world, and to make good children was to obey. [They thought] if I did not discipline my child, then the master was going to discipline my child.” In other words, domination was normalized through multiple colonial power constructs like racism, patriarchy, gender binaries as well as through the idea of the parent child relationship as hierarchical in nature. Domination is first normalized in the home between parent and child often using violence and abuse so that all other power dynamics rely on similar violent approaches in order to exhibit authority and maintain power. If we truly want to dismantle all structures of oppression, we must begin in the home by re-imagining the parent/child dynamic outside a paradigm of domination.
IG: @latinxparenting
latinxparenting.org
In this episode you hear us talking about how much healing writing this book has already brought us, and how healing is a part of our intention in writing this book. It might seem like it's only a collection of recipes, celebrations, songs, stories, etc. But it’s also more than that. It’s a book that is also about integrating a way of being, a way of living, and way of knowing that honors the history and ways of our ancestors, our Abuelas scarred by the wounds of colonization while giving us a way to heal those wounds. This is about grounding our everyday lives in a deep spiritual connection to our ancestors so that we may recognize the oppressive social dynamics by which we live, and allow ourselves and our children to survive and thrive in spite of these, and then push back on these forces as we work toward liberation.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/semillas-de-las-abuelas-book-project/x/22388135#/
We get real in this conversation about our relationship with money, and our debt. We reveal the real amount of student loans we owe, and deconstruct the systems of power at play not only in our debt but in how we are socialized to feel about our debt.
In this episode we discuss our updates, what we’ve been up to over the summer, and many of the accomplishments we have achieved. One of the biggest being our feature in Oprah Magazine. We originally planned for this to be a longer episode getting into our first topic of the season, student loans, but we decided to have this be a shorter episode just focused on our updates, and our plans for the season. We have a lot of interesting ideas for the season, and we hope you continue to join us.
Oprah Article
Semillas de Las Abuelas Indiegogo Campaign
In this episode we interview Norma Newton founder of the Hermosa Journal. She recently wrote and published an article for the parenting section of the New York Times entitled “I’m Darker than my daughter. Here’s Why it Matters.” In the article she shares an incident that occured with her daughter that had her confronting her own feelings of internalized colorism, and how she experienced this throughout her life. Colorism in and of itself is such a complex and yet important topic in the Latinx community. We are glad to be having this conversation with Norma to flesh out some of these complexities, especially as it relates to parenting and raising children while unpacking our own intergenerational traumas.
I often hear that children learn racism, and sexism and colorism and other discriminatory and oppressive ideas in the home. And though I think that is true, I also think that it's only one part of the picture. As you will hear in our interview with Norma, these ideas can also be gathered outside of the home, they are the very social norms by which we all live. Even for those of us who work hard at creating home dynamics that are loving, and accepting, and aware of the oppressive social dynamics, we have to remember that White sumperacy, male domination, oppressive power systems are the very air that we breath. It’s in our media, in fashion, in literature, it’s everywhere. So for all of our well intentions, we still cannot escape how the outside world will influence our children and bring these violent ideas home. Norma points out so well, that on the contrary we have to be overly intentioned on opposing these dynamics by, being transparent with our children about our own journeys toward self love, self realization and social justice.
Norma speaks so well, and so direct to the larger responsibilities of parenting beyond discipline and behavior monitoring, but really about establishing value in the home in a way that are aware of oppressive social dynamics, and gift our children with the tools to be able to navigate those on their own while feeling confident in who they are and their value in the world. This of course is but one part of the larger conversation that must continue to be had on colorism, but we think Norma shines a particularly powerful light on the need for healing and self compassion.
@hermosajournal
hermosajournal.com
“I’m Darker Than My Daughter. Here’s Why It Matters”- Norma Newton
In this episode we talk with Michelle Tellez and Judith Perez-Torres of Chicana Motherwork. They just released their book entitled The Chicana M(other)work Anthology, a collection of essays that “weaves together emerging scholarship and testimonios by and about self-identified Chicana and Women of Color mother-scholars, activists, and allies who center mothering as transformative labor through an intersectional lens.”
They speak to many themes during our convo including, how they came together as a collective, how they find work life balance, how they push back against the expectation of academia which is steeped in what Michelle calls a “neoliberal individualistis model of production,” and how they came to write and publish this wonderful piece of literature.
Cristina and I felt so validated to know that we are on a similar trajectory in our own book project with our fellow contributors. And what a gift working in collaboration can be when creating and producing important work.
There is so much here and a lot of it is really us picking their brain to demystify the publishing process, but I think it's a convo that can speak to anyone trying to navigate multiple parts of our identity, career, motherhood, parenthood, and following our passion.
We hope you enjoy this convo with these very talented mujeres.
Follow Chicana Motherwork on IG @chicanamotherwork
Website: chicanamotherwork.com
In this episode we continue our conversation with Lucha and Jovita. We start right where we left off, discussing the struggles and challenges of academia, the specific pressures we feel to produce, to hustle, to overwork ourselves. We talk about the toll it takes on our mental health having to balance our different responsibilities with basic self-care. We discuss approaches we have had to incorporate in order to navigate these pressures. Jovita reminds us to focus on the small victories.
The crux of our conversation lands us in discussing activism, what it means to be an activist, what those terms mean both historically and now. We discuss the historical tensions among activists and how activists spaces can highlight the egoism, toxicity, romanticism and patriarchy of community organizing that can uphold oppressive systems while we claim to be fighting them. Both Lucha and Jovita share their experiences in activist spaces culminating in a conversation about MEChA and the recent call for a name change. We are contending with some very deep critiques of MECha and the resistance to this name change. This can be a very scary critique to contend with given that there is a lot of emotional debate surrounding this topic.
We land on saying that ultimately activism needs to be more nuanced, more inclusive and that as educators we have a deep faith in the youth, in our students to guide activists efforts in the direction of liberation.
We love how Lucha articulates this work saying “it’s messy.” As Las Doctoras, this makes so much sense to us as we learn to be okay with the messiness of life, of our work, of our parenting, and our activism. We need to be okay with the mess as we grow, evolve, learn from our mistakes, from each other, and maintain our passion for liberation and freedom.
In this episode we interview Lucha Arevalo and Jovita Murillo Leon, two fellow academic mujeres doing amazing work in education public policy and public health respectively. This is our 10th episode and therefore thought it would be nice to return to the discussion we had in our first episode about our own academic journeys. In this first half of the interview with our guests we talk about the importance of mentorship or as Lucha calls it “femtorship.” We also discuss our intentions and investments in academia as grounded in our love for our communities, and in our feeling of responsibility to give back to those we can mentor. Jovita and Lucha each talk about the obstacles they had to overcome in their navigating the often toxic space of academia, and how their research speaks to their own experiences in higher education. This was such an amazingly fruitful conversations we decided to break it up into episodes. Take a listen and meet these brilliant mujeres.
Shout out to Lucha for defending her dissertation and graduating with her PhD. Felicidades Dra. Arevalo
Amazing quotes dropped in this episode:
“I don’t have to prove myself to anybody” - Lucha Arevalo
“I don’t want my life to be determined by my traumas” - Lucha Arevalo
Follow our guests on IG:
Lucha Arevalo- @laluxasigue
Jovita Murillo Leon- @jovitamurillo
We discuss the topics of spirituality in relationship with social justice. We have witnessed that the conversation around spirituality is too often focused solely on positive thinking or the idea of love and light. We feel, as well as other scholars and thinkers, that this is a narrow focus and does not take into consideration the structural inequalities at play. Spiritual rhetoric often fails to acknowledge the barrier to access to spiritual resources or modalities. We call our the apolitical and ahistorical grounding of particularly white spiritual spaces. We also recognize that we are not the first to be calling this out, and give credit to the other scholars and practitioners who are doing work in this area. We dive deep into how we have been thinking about this topic for a long time and ultimately try to articulate the need for more complexity and nuance when discussing spirituality. We call for the need to have spirituality be grounded in social justice, and for social justice work to integrate spiritual practices as self-care.
People mentioned in the episode that you should follow:
Layla Saad- http://laylafsaad.com/ - @laylafsaad
Rachel Ricketts- https://www.rachelricketts.com/ - @iamrachelricketts
Susanna Barkataki (not mentioned but does amazing work in this field) - https://www.susannabarkataki.com/ - @susannabarkataki
In this episode we interview Carmen Sima, an ayurvedic practitioner and intuitive guide and channeler. She shares with us here spiritual journey and what led her to her gifts and powers to connect with spiritual and ancestral realms. She highlights the importance of self-care as a means for all of us to connect to our own spiritual gifts and the healing power it can bring us. She also discusses the importance of this work in bringing our collective consciousness into a higher state of understanding. This conversation was so amazing and left us in awe. We continue to be healed in our journey and exploration of spirituality and share with our listeners all we have learned and have encountered along the way.
Carmen’s Contact Info
Website
IG @motherearthayurveda
Both of us were raised in traditional religions, Renee in Mexican Catholicism and Cristina in Evangelical Christianity. We have both experienced some spiritually transformational moments that drew us away from the problematic parts of these traditions and had us exploring more of our ancestral spiritual gifts and legacies that were grounded in non-european traditions. These transformational moments were not always pleasant and left us with so many questions about how we continue on a spiritual path. And yet we are now in a place where we can acknowledge the ongoing journey of our deepening relationship to spirituality, and give it the importance it deserves not just in our lives but in the work we do. Ultimately, we see the work we do in social justice, in reproductive justice, in education, in motherhood as a rooted in spirituality. In this episode we grapple with defining spirituality as the embracing of our whole humanity while also discovering the divinity in ourselves and in the world we live in. We are both grounded in a Chicana feminist understanding of multiplicity in regards to our identities, our perspectives and our spirituality. As we attempt to remain grounded in a spiritual journey that is complex and ever shifting, we also move in the world with an intention to give our children a deeper more nuanced understanding and practice of spirituality. As well, we center the work we do in this podcast, in our book project, and our academic careers within a spiritual framework. You hear us speak to our past experiences, to how we got to where we are now and to why spirituality is so much a part of our work.
In the next few episodes, we will be exploring this topic more landing on the importance of spirituality in social justice work, but also the importance of a social justice framework within spiritual work. Dive into this topic with us as we create conversations at the intersections of spirituality, religion, womanhood, sexuality, cultural identity, motherhood, and social justice.
In this episode we talk with Carolina Adame and Marlha Sanchez, our collaborators on a book project we have been working on titled Semillas de Las Abuelas. Our discussion of the book project leads us into a broader conversation about the legacy we want to leave our children, and the ancestral gifts we want to pass on to them. We talk about our personal investments in being a part of this project, and what talents we offer. We also describe the book as a collection of practical tools and resources with the intention of creating rhythms in the home that honor the seasons, the earth, and our ancestral traditions. It includes recipes, craft ideas, stories, ceremonies, holidays, celebrations, basically a how to book for Latinx families interested in earth based living and rhythms. Ultimately we see the book as a means by which to document all those traditions that have been passed down to us often through oral storytelling, so that we can ensure it gets passed onto future generations. We hope this book will help other Latinx families with the same intentions. We will be launching a Kickstarter campaign in April 2019 and hope you will help to support our project.
Carolina Adame
Carolinaadame.com
IG @carolinaadame
Marlha Sanchez
IG @mamadragonrisin
@unidoshomeschoolcooperative
@tienditaraicesyalas
Semillas de Las Abuelas Book Project
IG @semillasdelasabuelas
In this episode you will here Dr. Cristina share her Flow and birth story. Her story is so powerful in that she is so vulnerable in telling us so much about what was going on in her life that was impacting her relationship to her flow. Her story culminates with the birth of her child, and concludes with Renee and Cristina discussing the importance of these stories. We reflect on wanting to normalize positive birth experiences, and how much this idea play a part in the work we do. You will learn so much about Cristina and she should be applauded for her raw vulnerability in bringing her story to light.
In reflecting on the story of my relationship with my body and my moon cycle (period), I realize that I can clearly see a distinction before and after I turned 30. At 30, I moved into a home and farm with other women; I was a part of women’s circles regularly; I began a PhD program in Women’s Spirituality. I believe that I can thank, in particular, the wisdom I gained from women of color birth community as well as in my own experience giving birth. It has been a long, labyrinthine journey to be real, and reflecting on the journey brought up a lot of sadness and anger for me. I know I am not alone, and I share my story in the hopes that it encourages our listeners. Body awareness and moon celebrations are a part of my life now, and my community inspires this in me!
In this episode you will hear the first part of our interview with Cindy Luquin. We give some context to how this conversation speaks to the larger topic of reproductive justice. We talk about Sistersong who coined the term reproductive justice and how the work we do in our course, and the work that Cindy does is trying to achieve the goals laid out by Sistersong. Cindy tells her amazing story, and shares with us her work and why it is so important particularly for Latinx folx.
Topics discussed in interview
Cindy’s story
Informed choices
Reliance on doctors v trusting our intuition
Male body as universal body
White centered literature
Lack of access to knowledge
Definition of Fertility awareness
Cindyluquin.com
IG @cindy_luquin
Sistersong.net
lasdoctoras.teachable.com
This is our introductory episode. Bare with us, as we are learning how to do this podcasting stuff. Learn about who we are as Las Doctoras, what inspired us to do this pocast, and a little bit about what this first series will be about.
Flow Series- In this first series of episodes we highlight the topic of menstruation by interviewing radical muxeres who do work in this field, who are thinking about this topic in revolutionary ways, and passionate about sharing their work.
Shame and Menstruation- In this episode we interview Danellia Arechiga of Ma Mi AmorBirth and La Fuente LB community space. After leaving us a voice text about her frustrations with a bathroom sign regarding menstrual products, we were inspired to incorporate the topic of shame into our online course. Listen as we discuss the nuances of shame and how we attempt to reclaim our bodies, our cycles and our relationship to shame.
@mamiamorbirth
mamiamorbirth.com