Decision Making Practices and Conflict

I grew up on Osage & Caddo lands in an Ozark Mountain town. My mother raised me steeped in protests against the occupation of Iraq, for Palestinian liberation and environmental justice, and in the history of Black resistance and art. Though the South gave me an appreciation for moving slowly and seasonal rhythms, the broader context of whiteness made me hungry to find a place where I could experience a deeper sense of belonging to recover from the alienation of white supremacy. My path led me to social justice movement-steeped Oakland, California where I graduated from Mills College with a BA in Ethnic Studies, a field formed by Black and Brown student-led protest movements in the 1960s. ​The depth of apocalyptic suffering that my Syrian community is living is one of the hardest truths I have had to grapple with in my life, and the key to my heart-opening journey to becoming a healer. Finding a spiritual practice, sitting long meditation retreats and doing a decade of personal healing work supported me deeply. These experiences helped me to become intimate with the root causes of suffering within myself, and to recognize how these same causes, on a macro-level, create the institutions that harm Black and Brown bodies. I came to see that when we have access to enough safety, support, and resources to sustain awareness of our own suffering with compassion, we can open to the suffering of others. We can interrupt intergenerational cycles of harm. We can deeply transform ourselves and our world. And we each hold within us the medicine for our collective healing, more abundance of it than we might even imagine. The holistic healing modalities and lineage practices from which I benefit include somatic work, herbalism and curandurismo, dream work, energy healing, Sufi dhikr, Muslim prayer, and Buddhist meditation. I trained as a transformative facilitator, a doula, and an instructor of trauma-informed mindfulness meditation. I completed a two-year certification as an energy healing practitioner in the Syntara System method which gave me the principles of healing I would need to practice formally. Through my practice and study, I commit to creating containers for healing and safety that align us with our most beautiful selves, repair wounds caused by systemic oppression, and restore harmony and peace (“Weyam wa Salam”) to the earth, ourselves, and each other.

Jovida Ross is Executive Director at Real Food Real Stories (RFRS). RFRS's mission is to democratize food culture to feed our collective healing and transformation. Before joining the RFRS team, Jovida spent 7+ years as Director of Programs at Movement Strategy Center (MSC), where she co-founded The Transitions Initiative and led the design and facilitation of MSC’s Transitions Labs. These BIPOC-centered cross-movement learning and strategy spaces gathered more than 200 social justice movement leaders from across the country to explore the question: How do we transition our world from domination and extraction, to resilience, regeneration, and interdependence? With Jovida’s leadership, RFRS has come to clearly situate our work within a movement-building context, understanding that we work in concert with others whose visions align with ours. Many teachers and communities of practice have supported Jovida’s learning around embodiment practices, trauma stewardship and healing, and how personal and collective transformation are linked. She is particularly grateful for the guidance and mentorship of Kawelokū Norma Wong.