Learning to Come Home to Ourselves with Matthew Armstead

How do we begin to imagine futures not yet here? What can we do today to embody the liberation we want to see?

Matthew Armstead (they/them), an experiential facilitator and performance artist, asks how, right now, we can embody the worlds we want to create. Here, Matthew grounds in the past, present, and future, delving into Nichelle Nichols’s role on Star Trek and a transformative phone call from Martin Luther King, Jr., the current climate crisis, and performance pieces that have transformed their sense of what it means to come home to ourselves. 

This interview was recorded on Pendle Hill’s campus. The bell you hear in the background during the episode is the bell inviting people to the dining hall for each meal.

Read the transcript of this episode.

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Matthew Armstead (they/them) first learned about Pendle Hill when studying at Swarthmore College, and years later returned to Pendle Hill to co-develop then teach Radical Faithfulness in Action. Matthew is the Director of Culture Work Studios, where they accompany small, multiracial organizations committed to social justice through change processes to be who they say they want to be, with compassion, creativity, and complexity. At Culture Work Studios, Matthew also makes performance experiences for audiences that are reclaiming power to embody the futures we want to create. At the heart, Matthew helps us practice being the change we want to see. To learn more about Matthew's work, visit cultureworkstudios.com.

Watch Matthew's October 2023 First Monday Lecture, "Belonging in Unknown," on Pendle Hill's YouTube channel.

The transcript for this episode is available on https://pendlehillseed.buzzsprout.com/

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The Seed is a project of Pendle Hill, a Quaker center, open to all, for Spirit-led learning, retreat, and community. We’re located in Wallingford, Pennsylvania, on the traditional territory of the Lenni-Lenape people.

Follow us @pendlehillseed on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and subscribe to The Seed wherever you get your podcasts to get episodes in your library as they're released. To learn more, visit pendlehill.org/podcast.

Online Quaker Worship with Dwight: Dwight will attend the Pendle Hill online Quaker worship on the last Friday of the month from 8:30 to 9:10 AM (Eastern Time). Visit Pendle Hill Online Worship for details.

This project is made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H. & Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund.