Justice Walks July 2025

Crossword puzzles are sacred to me. I did them over the phone with my aunt (who doubled as a close friend) during the year she went through chemo and radiation. They now keep her presence close while helping to quiet my mind at the end of the day. Puzzling has also taught me lessons critical to my liberation journey.

While facilitating workshops I often share how the 5-letter answer to the clue “LA baller” forced me to recognize my deeply internalized sexism. I’m a life-long, female athlete and yet it took me 24-hours to realize the answer to that clue was “SPARK.” In my default mind, professional sports = men.

Doing crosswords has helped me to hold assumptions and certainties more loosely. As long as I remain convinced that the answer I’ve filled in for a clue is correct, even though it isn’t working, the puzzle will remain unsolved. For years, I would become self-righteous in these moments: “This puzzle must be wrong! There’s no other possible answer that makes sense! I’m right!” (This is how I felt about “LAKER” in the above example, even though it didn’t fit with the other answers.

Lately, I’ve found myself more easily able to wonder, “What if my current answer isn’t the right one for this puzzle? What are other ways this clue could be interpreted? What else could be true?” Sometimes the answer I initially try makes sense but isn’t what’s needed for this puzzle. For example, I’ve interpreted the clue as a noun, but that clue is also a verb, or vice versa. (Think “place” or “book”). Sometimes the answer I’m convinced is correct is just…wrong.

Asking the “what if” and “what else could be true” questions has increased how much I enjoy the puzzles. Exploring the multiple ways to approach the clue is more interesting than trying to find the one, correct way. My increasing comfort with holding assumptions and certainty loosely has it has made my relationships and community building richer and deeper. I’m less nervous about potential conflict or disagreement because I’m better at defaulting to curiosity vs defensiveness.

• What assumptions am I making?

• How can I “fact check” those assumptions?

• Where am I stuck in a certainty that hasn’t actually been tested?

• What systems are served by me remaining committed to these certainties and assumptions?

• Are those systems I want to serve?

Asking these questions and listening to the answers makes me ever more aware that every person in the same room is having a wildly different experience. I know there are bridges to build between those experiences. Now, I’m looking to co-create those bridges with folks rather than focused on leading them over the one I already built.

For example, a friend and fellow consultant and I recently began developing a workshop together for the first time. In one conversation she answered a question I’d posed in a way I never expected. I paused and realized that she had heard my question as being about logistics. I had asked it in terms of philosophical approach. Neither of us was wrong or right. Just like some crossword clues, my question had at least two valid ways to be interpreted.

“Oh, this is fascinating!” I said, “It seems like our brains work really differently. That will be a huge benefit as we develop materials together because we are bringing different perspectives. We’ll also have to be intentional in our communication, especially as we learn how each other thinks and works. Otherwise, we could easily, unintentionally confuse and frustrate each other!”

We are currently being overwhelmed with messages that our perspective is the only correct one, that bridges are impossible to build and that multiple “others” are the reason for our division (undocumented people, trans people, honestly anyone who is not a white, straight, able-bodied, male who agrees with the current administration’s world-view). Those messages want me certain, incurious, in an echo chamber, and afraid.

Bridges aren’t built if we are too afraid of the distance we need to cover. Puzzles aren’t solved when we have closed, immovable thought processes. My experiences and perspectives are one data point among many. Learning about others makes bridges stronger and safer. And it makes my puzzling more joyful. That makes my Aunt smile.

Learning Resource

In a world where folks have returned from the past, Harriet Tumban and her band, the Freedmans, work with a producer to create a Hip-Hop album and live show. This book pulses with humanity and especially explores the breadth of the Black experience in America across the centuries. I stopped to text quotes to friends multiple times while reading it: about taking time to feel our feelings and moving forward; about the critical role of rest; and about accepting that we are going to cause harm and “we can figure out how to repair.”

I’ve embedded a link in the image above to buy the book from my favorite Black-owned bookshop, Kindred Thoughts, or you can borrow it from the library. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Once you’ve read it, please reach out, I can’t wait to discuss it!

Folks to Follow

Taj Smith provides trauma-informed burnout prevention and recovery services for social change makers. His organization, Rooted Respite, is founded in the idea that we all get to live in the liberated world we work so hard to realize. Taj’s services include 1:1 coaching, community space, workshops, and speaking engagements.

Lots of us were socialized into feeling like we need to save the world, to the point of setting aside our own needs. Current dismantling of the civil rights and well-being of so many already-marginalized groups intensify the urgency around our desire for change. If you’re struggling to stay “ok,” check out Taj on LinkedIn or at his website above. His words always make my shoulders relax.

Joshua David Mardice is a social media marketer and brand transformation strategist by trade. I know him as a brilliant person to follow on LinkedIn. 99% of the time I see one of his posts and either laugh out loud, am struck speechless by his profundity, or have to google what he’s talking about to increase my cultural competency. He posts a lot, so I learn, laugh, and sit staring at the wall with my mind blown a lot. Check him out.

Ready for the next step?