Chrysalis Week

Posted by 1188sc on April 28, 2021

The Law Center will be closed for Chrysalis Week from May 3rd - May 7th 2021.

chrys·a·lis | \ ˈkri-sə-ləs
a protecting covering also : a sheltered state or stage of being or growth

The Law Center is taking a week off to re-energize and re-center ourselves as we go through a period of rapid growth and expansion. Although spring season is known as a time of blossoming, it is also an important time for renewal. We continue to learn from the wisdom of seasons by attuning to cycles of growth and rest.

In the past six months, we’ve said goodbye to two core staff members, added four new core staff, and onboarded eight new employees through our fiscally sponsored projects. The rapid change in our organizational composition happened during the height of the pandemic. Members of our Internal Resilience Circle (which cares for the personal, interpersonal, and organizational health of the Law Center) became aware that many of our colleagues wanted and needed to take a break. After a collective discussion, we realized a collective break is the best way to support each other in taking care of ourselves as individuals and as an organization.

Many things are allowing us to take this time off, but a foundational one is that we are a worker self-directed nonprofit where anyone can bring a proposal to change the way we work. This process and outcome is a direct impact of distributing power across all the workers of an entire organization.

We are following the lead of queer, feminist, and activist leaders who advocate for the practice of self-care in our movement spaces; an emancipatory and collective self-care, not a privatized “self care” who's focus is lulling us into acceptance of the economic, environmental, and social conditions we are born into. It is a self care that leads us closer to liberating ourselves from the systems of oppression that we have all internalized in different ways. It is our hope that you and your organizations can find ways to do the same.