Venus Renegade - Part 2: A reminder to forgo ego in movement work
Plus, pulling tarot cards at the Texas Capitol during a Mercury/Venus cazimi
This is part of a series I’m writing throughout this Venus retrograde reflecting on our activism over the past eight years. You can read Part 1 here.
On Tuesday night around 2am I was starting to get woozy, having eaten only Skittles for dinner while I waited for my name to be called to testify against House Bill 3 in front of the Texas House Public Education Committee.
I’d been at the Texas Capitol for 18 hours along with hundreds of others who wanted to let lawmakers know what we thought about a bill that would give $1 billion of taxpayer money to private schools (and according to some estimates up to $7.5 billion annually eventually). Ludicrous when you consider Texas is currently in the bottom 10 states when it comes to per-student spending for our public schools, despite the fact that we have the 8th largest economy IN THE WORLD (not the country!! the world!). We can’t fund our public schools but suddenly we can subsidize private schools?
Barely able to keep my eyes open at that point and realizing I still had to ride my bike home, I decided to throw in the towel before my name was called. A friend texted me 11 minutes later to say they’d just called me up to testify, but I was already in my neon green helmet flying down South Congress Avenue, hoping no drunk SXSW drivers would hit me. Ughhhh.
Part of me questioned whether I made the right decision by leaving… should I have just gutted it out? But the deeper part of me knew I was right to listen to my body — something my MS diagnosis has given me compelling permission to do.
When I was honest with myself about why I would stay even after my body was giving me clear signals that it was time to go, I realized that my motivation at that point was to prove I was “a real one” to my fellow advocates and activists. Now, I believe in solidarity and sacrifice in MANY cases. But bleary-eyed and slightly dizzy at 2am, this had become about pure ego for me. It wasn’t worth risking my health for street cred in the movement.
When I first rode off for the Capitol all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed that morning, my motivation was pure — I wanted my testimony to go down in the the official record in favor of our public schools. I wanted to do everything in my power to try and save a school system that I have watched crumble before my eyes as a parent of elementary kids in Texas for the past six years.
As part of the review that Venus retrograde invites us to undertake, I am looking more closely at my motivations when it comes to how I engage with our movements. There is simply too overwhelming an onslaught of shit coming at us to be fueling ourselves with the motivational equivalent of junk food — which is what street cred or “likes” or photo ops are. If we’re using those things as our main source of sustenance in this marathon, we’re going to burn out before we get to the first mile marker.
Here are some questions I plan to ask myself before I engage in any movement actions as a way of checking my motivations and preserving my efficacy and bandwidth:
Why do I REALLY want to take this action? What is my truest motivation?
What is the best possible outcome of me taking this action?
If I take this action and it doesn’t have the best possible outcome, will it have been worth it anyway? Why?
What is the personal risk to my health or safety if I take this action? Is it worth it?
Is there another way I could contribute to the larger goal that is more aligned with my personal skills?
Is there something else I could be doing that will move the needle and also be a more delightful use of my time? (This last question feels like a particularly Venus-y lens to use.)
In the case of HB3, I am so glad I spent 18 hours listening to public testimony even though I left before my own turn. I cannot describe the unparalleled feeling of being in the room while our future is debated by the people who have the power to decide it. There is nothing quite like that proximity. But that’s an entire essay for another day!
Ultimately, I had to be satisfied with the committee chair reading into the public record in my absence: “We show Becky Bullard as representing herself and registering against the bill but not testifying.”
Here’s what I would have said if I’d stayed:
My name is Becky Bullard, I am a parent of two children in an Austin public school.
Last week I comforted my crying fifth grader after she learned that her class would be getting its third teacher this year. “I don’t blame Mr. Adrian,” she said, through tears. “He found a job that paid more, and teaching is so hard. I'm happy for him. I just can’t believe this is happening again."
Mr. Adrian, a U.S. veteran, had stepped in to teach my daughter’s class when they suddenly lost their first teacher this year, putting his advertising career on pause as long as he could to help our kids even though he was not credentialed and had never taught. Our school hadn’t been able to find any other available qualified teachers – an epidemic all over Texas, not unique to our district.
In response to a roomful of parents distraught over losing yet another teacher, our principal explained that we were fortunate in comparison to other schools. Many Texas classes are being taught by rotating temporary substitutes, with no consistency from week to week. Our children deserve better.
Most of the teachers at our school do not have more than a couple years experience, and it is getting more difficult to keep teachers. Teachers who leave are clear about why – the demands are tremendous and the pay is unlivable. At a certain point they can no longer sacrifice their own well-being for our kids. Our teachers deserve better.
82% of native-born Texans stay put here their whole lives. Texas kids become Texas adults. If we further deprive the more than 5 million students in our public education system by siphoning taxpayer dollars away from public schools for all and toward private schools for a few, we are setting this state up for disaster for generations to come.
Please vote against HB3 and focus on fully funding our public schools. Thank you for your time.
When all was said and done, that public education committee hearing went on until 6:30am — 22.5 hours after it began. More than 700 members of the public showed up IN PERSON to register their opinion on HB3 — 481 were against it. And those who couldn’t be there in person made their voices heard, too: there are almost 3,000 pages of online comments submitted into the public record.
Because this Venus Renegade series is particularly astrology-centric, I will leave you with the tarot reading I did on the Capitol grounds in the midst of the committee hearing, moments before Mercury and Venus joined up in a cazimi:
Bearing witness is one of the most courageous things we can do. Your willingness to stay and listen for 18 hours is inspirational. Our written historical record is at risk, making it more vital than ever to have people like you show up.
Thanks so much for sharing this. You're an incredible role model to watch and learn from — I appreciate you sharing what it's been like for you to be down in it, and how you're trying to navigate it all amidst the insanity and tend to your energy, yourself, and the collective. Thank you for being there to testify!