Blog
Kwanzaa is seven days that we take to connect to our culture and heritage. The principles themselves serve as a guide and how we then choose to elaborate on them and celebrate them is left to our individual preference. I like to reflect on how I’m allowing each principle to show up in my daily life and how I can extend the practices moving forward.
Today’s principle is Ujima; collective work and responsibility. I thought about the responsibility we have to nourish ourselves and our families. The lessons may start from a young age in the kitchen and are to be passed down. For most of us, we spent many days here, learning recipes and the correct steps to prepare sustainable meals. Cooking itself holds a great part of our tradition. There is usually a story behind everything; why the greens are cleansed a certain way or how certain dishes got their names. These oral and written accounts are the responsibility of each generation to pass down to the next and sometimes it takes a collective effort to recall the total narration when pieces are lost over time. These recipes are what feed us and keep us alive; both literally and figuratively.
This is part of how we keep our story going. But what of our future?
As we reevaluate our ways of eating; many of us shifting to modified or full vegetarian/vegan diets out of necessity or preference, does our responsibility also change?
In addition to ensuring that our story continues to be told, I think an additional responsibility comes in the form of taking time to enlighten ourselves. There is also the undertaking of understanding how continuing to eat certain foods; namely those high in salt and animal fats, can be detrimental to our health. Armed with that knowledge, it is irresponsible on our part to not take matters into our own hands to implement change on both individual and collective scales. How else can we hope to sustain future generations continuing to exhibit unchanged behavior?
Some worry that in assuming this new identity of vegetarian or vegan that our culture is also lost, but that is simply not the case. Removing or replacing things just means that the story takes a turn. I believe that even with substitutions in our eating habits, our legacy will still be a rich one. Not to mention, if we explore history further, we see that consuming animal parts didn’t always have such a heavy role in our diets as it does now. Perhaps then it is more accurate that in removing meat we are infact growing closer to our cultural roots?
It is the responsibility of those of us now embarking on this journey to plant the seeds so that others may bare the fruit of our work. We must actively consider how these changes potentially benefit the whole. When we contemplate our reasoning for adjusting our diet, the answer is clear. The preservation of current and future generations is what amounts from this change. When we shift as a whole, focusing on working towards a unanimous goal, the results are more concrete.
While it is true that a lone seed may bare fruit; the cohesive efforts of an entire garden and homogenous ecosystem yields an even more bountiful harvest.
How is that collective work achieved?
Start at home first. Sometimes our immediate family are more willing to try new things than we give them credit for. When its time for the family gathering, offer to make one of the traditional family recipes. This is a good opportunity to substitute a few ingredients to demonstrate how versatile vegetarian/vegan cooking can be. Maybe you might even stir things up and bring a few dishes of your own creation? This is another chance to show versatility and to also allow your family to be adventurous, all while potentially adding a new dish to the family cookbook.
The alternative is to find your own tribe. Let’s be honest, the other side of the discussion is that, not everyone in your bloodline is going to want to come along with you on your journey into veganism or vegetarianism. It sucks, but its also ok. It can be hard to find your people at first but don’t give up hope. Attending community events is a great way to meet others on the same path as you and to be able to build relationships. This is also a chance to really be more active with moving forward to expand on ideas of the future. When you find people who share your views the efforts for collective work can be attainable. As you all work to build and strenghten your network, it opens space to circle back around to others who may have missed the train the first time.
I think regardless of what community looks like for each of us, we each recognize the responsibility we have moving forward and the work that there is to do. It should be understood that our responsibility will still be to pass down the lessons we learned around the kitchen table; the methods, the secret spices, the story that pairs with each dish. But in doing so, we shall also share new tales. The traditions that we amend along the way will above all else, mean more pages added to our recipe books.
