In this episode of the Brown Rice Hour, Konda Mason speaks with Noliwe Alexander about her work with two non-profit organizations, Peace At Any Pace and Deep Time Liberation.
Noliwe Alexander has been a student of Vipassana meditation for over 20 years. Throughout this time of deep devotion to the Dharma, Noliwe has become a dedicated practitioner and meditation teacher. She dedicates her BuddhaDharma practice and teachings to the BiPOC, LGBTQIA+, At Risk and Elder communities. Noliwe is the founder of Peace At Any Pace, a non-profit organization that offers healing opportunities through culturally specific journeys. She is also a facilitator for Deep Time Liberation, a non-profit organization that offers ancestral healing journeys.
Food and Family
Konda welcomes Noliwe to the Brown Rice Hour, and asks what was her comfort food as a child. They discuss the importance of our relationship with food, and how food tells the story of a family. Noliwe shares a bit about her background, how she found Insight Meditation, and how connecting to the Dharma made her realize she was identifying with her own suffering.
“Food security made it feel like there was love… Especially when it’s made with love.” – Noliwe Alexander
Working with Ancestral Trauma (25:40)
Konda and Noliwe discuss her non-profit organization, Peace At Any Pace, which does powerful workaround ancestral trauma and connecting people from the African diaspora to their ancestral history. They talk about Noliwe’s work as a facilitator for Deep Time Liberation, a non-profit organization that offers people from the African diaspora the possibility of freedom from suffering, freedom from the stories that are lodged within.
“What we ask of people is to show up, open, and do the work. And actually, to take the crust that has formed around your heart and begin to let that crust go, and open your heart and be willing to have faith in this process, in this program, that you’re going to be able to come out of the other side of it.” – Noliwe Alexander
Dr. Sará King joins Raghu Markus to talk about intergenerational healing on Mindrolling Ep. 400
Deep Time Liberation (45:12)
Konda asks for more details about the Deep Time Liberation program and what some of the results have been for people who’ve gone through that journey. Noliwe talks about how she helps lay the groundwork for people to unearth the connection to their ancestors, and how the next level of healing is forgiveness. They end the show with a discussion of how this work has impacted Noliwe as a dharma teacher.
“People have said that they didn’t know until they actually called in their ancestors – saw their pictures, brought their names in – how interconnected they were with who their ancestors were, how they walked, how they lived, how they breathed.” – Noliwe Alexander
