How We Show Up - by Mia Birdsong (Paperback)

About the Book

"A provocative, essential guide to showing up for each other and cultivating community, from activist, community organizer and thought leader whose viral TED talk has been viewed more than 1.8 million times"--

Book Synopsis

A provocative, essential guide to cultivating community and solidarity, from an activist, community organizer, and thought leader whose viral TED talk has been viewed more than 1.5 million times.
From Occupy to Black Lives Matter to the various marches and protests, we have had some powerful moments over the last decade that have galvanized and created new, but brief, feelings of community. Many of us, however, haven't figured out how to spark that feeling on our own, or how to build on or sustain those moments. We are longing for a kind of sugar-borrowing and stoop-sitting closeness we imagine existed in the 50s.
In How We Show Up, community visionary Mia Birdsong delivers a compelling, timely understanding of what true, authentic family and community can look like -- outside of the 2-parent, 2.5 kids norm we all have in our heads. Today we have more single parents, couples who raise children outside of marriage, and more people growing older alone. Tackling topics like creating safe spaces, creativity in community, raising children in community, and more, How We Show Up is the antidote to the social fractures we face in our nation today. By sharing stories and actionable advice, and taking cues from marginalized communities -- people of color, women, the LGBTQ movement -- Mia Birdsong offers us the blueprint we need to build true community wherever we are.

Review Quotes

"Mia Birdsong is one of our most important thinkers and strategists for how we build structures to support the families that we actually have and the kinds of families we would build if we weren't all so obsessed with respectability. This book gives us both the vision and the blueprint for how to do this in ways that feel sustainable, and quite frankly otherworldly. I left this book feeling something I haven't felt in a long time...hopeful. "--Brittney Cooper, author of Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower

"Mia Birdsong's deeply personal book calls forth a deeply public truth: that we're all better off when we're all better off. Her search for the meaning of community and belonging will inspire Americans from many walks to show up in a new way."--Eric Liu, CEO of Citizen University and author of Become America

"This book is a blueprint to being vulnerable enough to love harder, dig deeper and be unafraid to redefine and expand our relationships. A beautiful and helpful piece of work. "--Tiq Milan, writer and LGBTQ advocate

"This is a the book we've all been waiting for about the 'craft'--and that's what Mia Birdsong so insightfully names it--of creating community. She's a master craftswoman herself--gathering stories of such intentionality, honesty, and reliability that you will immediately start living your life more radically and reaping the rewards."--Courtney E. Martin, author of The New Better Off: Reinventing the American Dream

About the Author

Mia Birdsong is an activist, facilitator, and storyteller. A Senior Fellow of the Economic Security Project, she was also an inaugural Ascend Fellow of The Aspen Institute and New American California Fellow. She was founding Co-Director of Family Story and Vice President of the Family Independence Initiative, Mia speaks widely at conferences and gatherings across the country. She lives with her loved ones on the occupied land of the Chochenyo Ohlone people (AKA Oakland, CA). Read more about her work at miabirdsong.com.