Updates
A chronological view of all updates and changes to tender.garden.
July 22, 2025
4 updates
Article: Hanna Williams on Cancel Culture and Conflict
On her newsletter and in an Instagram video, Hanna Williams shares thoughts on cancel culture and the importance of learning to sit with the discomfort of conflict resolution. Hanna shares how conflict resolution skills are essential for building community: "I see so many people claiming they want to be in community, that they want to feel connected to their network of friends and peers, but who consistently demonstrate that they lack the one skill truly needed to make a community strong: conflict." "Conflict skills geared toward finding resolution, returning to connection, and creating stronger relationships where everyone’s unique perspective is honored and considered." Doing conflict well requires being present with the discomfort of hearing different perspectives: "It brings up a lot of intense feelings. In fact, one of the essential qualities needed to do conflict well is a tolerance for discomfort—a tolerance for high sensation—because it just comes with the territory." "Even in the best relationships, it brings up big emotions and requires a deep capacity to set our shit aside and hear people out. To get out of our own heads and into the hearts of others." She mentions how the intra-movement cancel culture seen in many leftist spaces can be a way to avoid doing the work of learning to do conflict: "And my take is that this obsession with saying and doing the perfect thing—the thing that has infiltrated the political left—is actually a form of conflict avoidance." "So many people on the left approach difficult conversations with one goal: to convert the other person."
Vulnerability
Choosing to stay soft and vulnerable in a world full of violence and conflict avoidance is a powerful act. Being present with vulnerability enables deeper connection.
Book: Nonviolent Communication - A Language of Life
This book by Marshall B. Rosenberg describes Nonviolent Communication (NVC) as philosophy and method. Nonviolent Communication is a process with the goal to focus our attention on four pieces of information: "First, we observe what is actually happening in a situation: what are we observing others saying or doing that is either enriching or not enriching our life?" "The trick is to be able to articulate this observation without introducing any judgment or evaluation–to simply say what people are doing that we either like or don't like." "Next, we state how we feel when we observe this action: are we hurt, scared, joyful, amused, irritated?"
Safe(r) Space
A Safe Space is a space where the goal is for people to feel safe, respected, and free from fear of violence or judgment. It provides a protected environment that fosters openness, vulnerability, and mutual understanding. It is also often referred to as a Safer Space to emphasize that no space is completely free from violence and discrimination–and to show the intention to make the space progressively safer over time. See also: Brave(r) Space The safer we feel in a space, the freer and more vulnerable we can be there. For us, conflicts usually show how safe we feel in a space: when harm occurs, we strive for all involved to take responsibility, learn from the situation, and find ways to interact with more understanding and compassion in the future. If this does not happen, if conflicts are swept under the rug, it can result in the space feeling less safe. We share less of what’s going on inside us because we fear further hurt. For us, there are three ways to handle such situations: - Conflict Resolution: The attempt to repair, resolve conflicts, and create a space where all involved feel safer again. - Adaptation: If this doesn’t work (e.g., because involved parties are unwilling to engage in conflict resolution at the moment), we need to adjust our behavior. We show ourselves less freely and vulnerably to prevent hurt. - Distance: We decide whether to continue staying in a space or if we would have to adapt so much that it makes more sense to keep our distance for the time being.
July 21, 2025
11 updates
Article: Damien Echols on Sovereignty
On his Patreon, Damien Echols published an article called Sovereignty. It's about kingship as a metaphor for power from within, not power over others. "Kingship, in its esoteric sense, doesn’t mean power over others. It means sovereignty—mastery over the inner kingdom. A true king has conquered not the world, but the self." "The crown isn’t given. It’s earned through sacrifice, discipline, and transmutation. That’s why kingship is always preceded by the Work. You don’t get to wear the crown without walking through the fire." "Even in the Bible, when Jesus is accused of claiming to be king, it wasn’t just a political accusation—it was a metaphysical one. They feared not a rebellion, but a man whose inner authority made him immune to the control of external structures. He was sovereign in a way that threatened all systems built on fear and dependence." "In magick, we talk about “becoming king of your realm.” That doesn’t mean egoic dominion—it means taking full responsibility for your energy, your thoughts, your actions, your path." "No more blaming others. No more waiting to be rescued. No more serving false masters—whether internal or external. The true king serves the divine spark within, and nothing else."
Article: What Love Isn't by Yung Pueblo
In What Love Isn't, Yung Pueblo writes about attachment being the "greatest enemy of love". "The greatest enemy of love is attachment. Why? Because it tries to disguise itself as love. There is a similarity between closeness and clinging that easily confuses the mind." "a fear of loss or craving to control creates the type of clinging that tries to grasp another person with tension" "Attachment is essentially a refusal to come to terms with change, it’s an attempt to keep things the same or under your power." "Love is meant to be grounded in freedom. Attachment is an opposing force to freedom; it tries to keep things the same, while freedom understands that change is ultimately good." "Attachment will create images in your mind of what you crave the most and it will direct your energy into creating and maintaining them in the external world." "We can end up “falling in love” with the idea we have of someone and whenever the reality of that person deviates from the image we have of them in our mind, we fear the dissonance and fight against it." "Attachment will ask our loved ones to stay the same, but this is impossible when the river of existence constantly flows forward."
Attachment
Attachment means trying to control things the way they currently are (or our idea of how they should be). The practice of non-attachment means gradually letting go of desire, expectations, and idealization. "Attachment is essentially a refusal to come to terms with change, it’s an attempt to keep things the same or under your power." – Yung Pueblo in What Love Isn't
Conflict Avoidance
Conflict avoidance means having (conscious and unconscious) strategies to evade conflict resolution and the vulnerability that comes with it. Too often, we are outsourcing our conflict resolution to hierarchies.
Free Palestine
How can we help end the violence Palestinians are facing, putting pressure on our governments to stop enabling the oppression and genocide? Our focus the last 2 years has been mainly on the external: Trying to raise awareness and amplify voices with the goal to have more people stand up and get loud agains the horrors of Israel's actions against the Palestinian people. Because we were socialized in Germany, this means specifically doing the shadow work in recognizing our own Anti-Palestinian and Anti-Arab racism and talking about this with other Germans, especially highlighting the media bias and state repression against Palestine solidarity here in Germany. There is a shift in public perception happening that shows that staying loud works! However, we're still focused a lot on making other people join us instead of trying to work together and organize more effectively. With collective power, we can build more sustainable infrastructure and put pressure on people in power. This is why we want to direct our energy more towards internal work and help empower the resistance, for example with conflict resolution.
Gaza Genocide
While the word genocide was largely being suppressed by Western media until 2025, a growing number of genocide scholars and human rights experts are getting increasingly clear: - The International Association of Genocide Scholars declared that "Israel’s policies and actions in Gaza meet the legal definition of genocide in Article II of the United Nations Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide." - United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, Francesca Albanese calls Israel a settler-colonial project and highlights corporations who "have profited from Israel’s economy of illegal occupation, apartheid and now, genocide." - Amnesty International concludes "Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza." - Human Rights Watch published a report in December 2024 titled "Extermination and Acts of Genocide." - Omer Bartov, professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University, wrote a piece in NYT called I’m a Genocide Scholar. I Know It When I See It.: "My inescapable conclusion has become that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people. Having grown up in a Zionist home, lived the first half of my life in Israel, served in the I.D.F. as a soldier and officer and spent most of my career researching and writing on war crimes and the Holocaust, this was a painful conclusion to reach, and one that I resisted as long as I could. But I have been teaching classes on genocide for a quarter of a century. I can recognize one when I see one." Israeli military officials told the New York Times that there is no proof that Hamas has been systematically stealing aid that was supposed to go to the people in Gaza. "It's not our fault. Hamas is stealing the food" is a lie that has been used heavily over the last 2 years to justify Israel's deliberate starvation of Palestinians.
Love
"The word 'love' is most often defined as a noun, yet all the more astute theorists of love acknowledge that we would all love better if we used it as a verb." – bell hooks in All About Love "To begin by always thinking of love as an action rather than a feeling is one way in which anyone using the word in this manner automatically assumes accountability and responsibility." – bell hooks in All About Love
Article Series: Because We Need Each Other
"Because We Need Each Other: Conversations on Cancel Culture" is an article series by Erika Sasson, Celia Kutz, Kazu Haga, and Shilpa Jain that was published on The Forge and Convergence. You can access the full series here. Find the article here "This first article shares our origin story. We were all part of a gathering called “Because We Need Each Other,” in which 25 people from across the US came together to grapple with the impacts of a punitive pattern in social change/movement left spaces." The authors share the motivation for the gathering and the importance of improving the ways we collaborate in movement spaces. "Given the profound political moment we are in—with the unraveling of many democratic rights and freedoms—it feels more important than ever to strengthen the ways in which we come together on the left" "Our capacity to mobilize is strengthened by our ability to work through disagreement and come back from conflict." They also share important insights from the gathering: "The key takeaway from our gathering—beyond any discrete action steps—was the power of airing our questions in a trusted environment." "Because we need each other, we understand that we also need worldviews that reflect and commit to wholesome, spiritual practices in our movement spaces. We came together to remember, in the important words of one of our beloved Indigenous elders, that we are all cousins. And that we want to continue treating each other as relatives in our work and communities as we go forward in these times."
Spiritual Ego
Spiritual Ego is the phenomenon when spiritual practice and the power that comes with it inflates the ego. "The energy doesn’t lie. It just flows. And if you’re not aware of the structures it’s pouring into, you may be reinforcing the very illusions you’re trying to transcend." – Damien Echols in The Shadow Fed by Light Shadow Work helps integrate these aspects of the self.
Conflict Update June 2025
Over the past few months, my training as a mediator has led me to dive deep into the topic of conflict resolution. And I had to realize: I thought it would be so simple. When I first discovered the potential of conflict resolution a few years ago and began exploring it more deeply, I truly believed things would only get better from there. I saw how much it helped Pia and me to speak more openly in our relationship. And I thought I could apply that same approach to all my other relationships. This kicked off a painful learning process. I began to understand more clearly that I’m still far from where I want to be. Just because I have theoretical ideas about how to deal with conflict doesn’t mean I can put them into practice. What’s become increasingly clear to me is that every conflict and every relationship is different and comes with its own unique challenges. And that I’m still far from being the kind of communicator I want to be when things get tough. This often led to mutual hurt and feelings of powerlessness. The topic of responsibility has become more and more central to me in recent months.
Book: All About Love
All About Love is a popular book by bell hooks. "To open our hearts more fully to love's power and grace we must dare to acknowledge how little we know of love in both theory and practice." "The word 'love' is most often defined as a noun, yet all the more astute theorists of love acknowledge that we would all love better if we used it as a verb." "To begin by always thinking of love as an action rather than a feeling is one way in which anyone using the word in this manner automatically assumes accountability and responsibility." "One of the most important social myths we must debunk if we are to become a more loving culture is the one that teaches parents that abuse and neglect can coexist with love." "Lots of people learn how to lie in childhood. Usually they begin to lie to avoid punishment or to avoid disappointing or hurting an adult." "In far too many cases children are punished in circumstances where they respond with honesty to a question posed by an adult authority figure." "When we hear another person's thoughts, beliefs, and feelings, it is more difficult to project on to them our perceptions of who they are." "All awakening to love is spiritual awakening."
July 19, 2025
2 updates
Cancel Culture
We've dismissed the term cancel culture for a long time because we saw it mainly as a way for people who are confronted with making a mistake to evade accountability. What’s often forgotten is that the roots of this practice lie in Black liberation movements, where calling out harmful behavior publicly became a vital way to seek justice outside of systems that fail to protect marginalized communities. Over time, however, the term has been co-opted and repurposed—often by those in power—to deflect criticism. Rather than taking responsibility for the harm that was caused, people often focus on how the injustice is communicated. This shifts the attention away from the root of the issue. We believe it's crucial to listen to people experiencing violence and injustice, no matter how it is delivered. There should always be space for righteous anger. However, recently, we started reflecting on our own behavior, how punishment is ingrained in our culture and how this leads to judgment and finger pointing in cases where more effective conflict resolution could be possible. When we focus too much on outer spheres and neglect the necessary inner work, this can lead to externalization and cancel culture.
Article Series: Because We Need Each Other
"Because We Need Each Other: Conversations on Cancel Culture" is an article series by Erika Sasson, Celia Kutz, Kazu Haga, and Shilpa Jain that was published on The Forge and Convergence. You can access the full series here. Find the article here "This first article shares our origin story. We were all part of a gathering called “Because We Need Each Other,” in which 25 people from across the US came together to grapple with the impacts of a punitive pattern in social change/movement left spaces." The authors share the motivation for the gathering and the importance of improving the ways we collaborate in movement spaces. "Given the profound political moment we are in—with the unraveling of many democratic rights and freedoms—it feels more important than ever to strengthen the ways in which we come together on the left" "Our capacity to mobilize is strengthened by our ability to work through disagreement and come back from conflict." They also share important insights from the gathering: "The key takeaway from our gathering—beyond any discrete action steps—was the power of airing our questions in a trusted environment." "Because we need each other, we understand that we also need worldviews that reflect and commit to wholesome, spiritual practices in our movement spaces. We came together to remember, in the important words of one of our beloved Indigenous elders, that we are all cousins. And that we want to continue treating each other as relatives in our work and communities as we go forward in these times."
July 16, 2025
2 updates
Article: Damien Echols on Spiritual Ego
On his Patreon, Damien Echols published an article called The Shadow Fed by Light: How Magick Can Inflate the Ego. This phenomenon is often called spiritual ego. "power—real power—doesn’t just amplify the sacred. It amplifies everything" "Magick doesn’t discriminate. It’s not a moral force. It’s a tool. And when you pull in chi, or spiritus, or call down a planetary current, it doesn’t just fill the parts of you that you want to grow. It fills all of you. Every chamber. Every crack." "The energy doesn’t lie. It just flows. And if you’re not aware of the structures it’s pouring into, you may be reinforcing the very illusions you’re trying to transcend." "You’ll notice this in subtle ways at first. A little more self-importance. A sharper edge to your online posts. The creeping belief that you’re further along than others." "No one makes it far in magick without eventually encountering this shadow. And the ones who do make it far? They’re the ones who learn to bow. Not to external gods, but to the Work itself. They understand that the more power you channel, the more responsibility you carry—not just in the world, but within yourself." "That’s why grounding practices—zazen, martial arts, daily service, kaizen—aren’t optional." "And more than anything, that’s why watching yourself is part of the path. Notice your tone. Your impulse to correct. The part of you that feels insulted when someone doesn’t recognize your insight. These aren’t flaws to be ashamed of—they’re signals. They show you where the energy is leaking into ego instead of soul." "The more energy you gather, the more discipline you need to hold it. And not just discipline of action, but discipline of identity. Because if you let the ego grab hold of the power, it’ll hijack the whole operation. You’ll still be practicing. You’ll still be invoking. But you’ll be doing it for the wrong self."
Article: Damien Echols on Spiritual Ego
On his Patreon, Damien Echols published an article called The Shadow Fed by Light: How Magick Can Inflate the Ego. This phenomenon is often called spiritual ego. "power—real power—doesn’t just amplify the sacred. It amplifies everything" "Magick doesn’t discriminate. It’s not a moral force. It’s a tool. And when you pull in chi, or spiritus, or call down a planetary current, it doesn’t just fill the parts of you that you want to grow. It fills all of you. Every chamber. Every crack." "The energy doesn’t lie. It just flows. And if you’re not aware of the structures it’s pouring into, you may be reinforcing the very illusions you’re trying to transcend." "You’ll notice this in subtle ways at first. A little more self-importance. A sharper edge to your online posts. The creeping belief that you’re further along than others." "No one makes it far in magick without eventually encountering this shadow. And the ones who do make it far? They’re the ones who learn to bow. Not to external gods, but to the Work itself. They understand that the more power you channel, the more responsibility you carry—not just in the world, but within yourself." "That’s why grounding practices—zazen, martial arts, daily service, kaizen—aren’t optional." "And more than anything, that’s why watching yourself is part of the path. Notice your tone. Your impulse to correct. The part of you that feels insulted when someone doesn’t recognize your insight. These aren’t flaws to be ashamed of—they’re signals. They show you where the energy is leaking into ego instead of soul." "The more energy you gather, the more discipline you need to hold it. And not just discipline of action, but discipline of identity. Because if you let the ego grab hold of the power, it’ll hijack the whole operation. You’ll still be practicing. You’ll still be invoking. But you’ll be doing it for the wrong self."