At Sister Warriors, spirituality is one of our core values because while healing is about changing systems, it is also about remembering who we are. Spirituality is deeply personal and can be expressed in many ways. For some, it is rooted in faith and prayer. For others, it is found in cultural traditions, ceremony, ancestors, music, nature, creative expression, or simply showing up in community. Rather than asking us to fit into one definition, spirituality invites us to reconnect with what brings us meaning, belonging, and hope.
For much of my life, I believed spirituality fit neatly into a box. If it didn’t look like what I had been taught, I questioned it. Some of the cultural practices carried by my ancestors were spoken about with fear instead of curiosity. Looking back, I know my family wasn’t trying to disconnect me from my roots. They were passing down what they believed would keep us close to the Creator. Today, I see something more expansive. I’ve come to recognize that many of the practices that have sustained our communities for generations were never about pulling us away from the Creator. They were ways of drawing closer to one another, honoring life, remembering those we’ve lost, and finding hope when life felt unbearable.
When we pause and look closely, we realize that spirituality has always lived among us.
It is present in the candlelight vigils we hold when someone passes away. In pouring one out for loved ones whose memory continues to shape us. In praying over a meal before we eat. In embracing someone who is grieving. In the songs that carry us through heartbreak. In checking on a neighbor. In honoring our elders and listening to the wisdom they’ve gathered over a lifetime. These moments remind us that spirituality isn’t only something we believe. It is something we live and it is woven into the ways we care for one another.
Community elder, Maestra Debra Camarillo once shared a story that has stayed with me. A young giraffe asked his mother why giraffes have such long legs. “To see danger coming across the savanna,” she answered. “Why such long eyelashes?” “To protect our eyes from the dust.” “Why such a long neck?” “So we can reach nourishment that other animals cannot.” After hearing each answer, the young giraffe paused and asked, “Then why are we in the zoo?”
That question has become a powerful metaphor.
Many of us carry gifts, wisdom, resilience, and healing practices that were designed for us to flourish. Yet trauma, colonization, incarceration, racism, poverty, and other systems of oppression can disconnect us from those gifts. Like the giraffe, we begin to question ourselves. And it’s not because we lack purpose, but because we’ve been placed in environments that make it difficult to remember who we are.
Healing, then, is not about becoming someone new. It is about returning to ourselves. It is about remembering what the Creator has already placed within us.
Another Community elder who I hold close to my heart, Mestra Susie Armijo, once told me “We sit in these cells, not realizing the door is wide open. Why do we stay incarcerated by our wounds?… Adelante. Go forward.” Her words invite us to ask an honest question: What pain, fear, or belief is keeping us from stepping into the freedom that is already possible? The wounds we carry are real, and they deserve tenderness. But they do not have to become our permanent home. In healing, no one is asking us to pretend the pain never happened. It reminds us that pain is not the end of our story.
I believe the Creator never intended for us to remain imprisoned by our wounds. Even in our hardest moments, there is an invitation toward healing, restoration, and hope. Sometimes that invitation comes through prayer. Sometimes through community. Sometimes through the wisdom of an elder, the embrace of a loved one, the rhythm of a song, or the quiet moment when we finally remember that we are worthy of love.
If you’re reading this while carrying grief, trauma, shame, or exhaustion, I hope you know this: you are not broken beyond repair. There is wisdom within you. There is resilience within you. There is a community ready to walk beside you. And there is a Creator who has never stopped calling you toward wholeness. Even when you can’t yet see the path, trust that it exists. The door is open.
This month, take time to reflect on the practices that have sustained your family and community. Light a candle. Share a meal. Pray. Spend time in nature. Listen to an elder. Tell the stories of those who came before you. However you connect with your spirit, and with one another, remember this: healing has never been about finding something you were missing. It is about remembering the medicine you’ve carried all along. Trust the journey. Adelante. Go forward.