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The March Toward Justice Requires Rest

Relentless grinding will eventually wear you out. Be strategic, but take a nap.

Danielle Moodie
ZORA
5 min readJul 22, 2020

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Close-up shot of healthy young woman meditating outdoors with her eyes closed.
Photo: NickyLloyd/Getty Images

I’ve come to realize over the past few years that being “woke” is utterly exhausting. My aspiration to be “woke” began as a strong desire to be aware, conscious, and plugged into the exploitation and oppression of marginalized peoples so that I could be of service. But somehow during my journey into sounding the alarm clock of the resistance through various podcasts and platforms, I forgot how to rest. And how does one continue to fight the machinations of white supremacy if they are too tired to even enter the battlefield?

It has become evident that exhaustion is indeed the point. Why? Because it is the breeding ground for hopelessness. The organized chaos oozing out of the White House is strategic. If you keep people on edge, filled with anxiety, so tuned in that they have forgotten to blink, then soon fatigue creeps in, and like a wrestler in the WWE they will eventually tap out. Every time Trump tweets out congratulatory messages for white supremacists, comes up with a new insult name for Democrats, or obsesses over preserving the Confederacy — these are all pointed distractions. And what the enemies of justice know for sure is that when most people finally do tap out, they are unlikely to tap back in. On top of this…

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ZORA
ZORA

Published in ZORA

A publication from Medium that centers the stories, poetry, essays and thoughts of women of color.

Danielle Moodie
Danielle Moodie

Written by Danielle Moodie

is the host of #WokeAF Daily & co-host of the podcast #democracyish. She covers all the news and happenings at the intersection of politics and pop culture.

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