The Fine Line Between Activism and Burnout

A candid reflection of trans activism and resistance in a post-COVID world

Photo by Tayla Kohler on Unsplash

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Author Note: If you want to skip my story and get right to the journal prompts, feel free to by use Ctrl + F [Cmd + F on Mac] and type in reflection questions.

The spark that marked a turning point

It’s no secret that social justice defines and shapes the world around us.

Whether you are a community organizer, a storyteller or a content creator, we all contribute to the social justice movement in unique ways. While there are people that are called to do this work at an early age, others fall into the work later in their life after we develop a greater understanding of ourselves. In my case, the moment that I stopped denying that I was trans marked the beginning of my activism journey.

Being a trans activist wasn’t on my bingo card, but I can pinpoint the moment my advocacy journey began. It was June 2020. I was nearing six years on testosterone and already had top surgery, I still found myself craving connection with other queer people. Being the shy introvert that I was, I wasn’t too keen on awkwardly drinking at bars or staying out until 4am the next morning. But I knew I had to do something or else the isolation, magnified by the COVID-19 lockdown, would continue.

On June 14th, 2020, I decided to spend my 28th birthday attending the Queer Liberation March outside of the Brooklyn Museum. Living in Sheepshead Bay at the time, the event was only a hop and a skip away by train. I donned my rainbow bandana, trimmed up my beard, wore my Gender Roles are Dead tank top and made my way there.

Once I arrived on the scene, I remember the instant feeling of being a part of something bigger. So much bigger that I lost myself among the sea of diverse masked faces in the crowd, listening to Ceyenne Doroshow, founder of Gays and Lesbians Living in a Transgender Society (G.L.I.T.S), announce to the world that they exceeded their fundraising goal, securing $1 million dollars for a 12-unit apartment building in Queens to provide housing opportunities for black trans individuals. I remember the crowd exploding with enthusiasm, with myself sharing in their joy before we marched in solidarity through the streets.

Before I knew it, I threw myself into doing the work before I realized what I signed up for. Already running a Facebook group for transmasculine people, I craved to do more. I said yes to every opportunity and event, spreading myself thin as if scraping everything out of a finished tub of peanut butter. How could I say no when there was so much injustice in the world? Little did I know, that the human body has a funny way of forcing us to slow down.

After months of trying to keep up with the latest rally, meeting or coalition, I felt the anxiety creep up on me and I found myself dreading the hours up until I had to tap into the next coalition Zoom call after work. As I continued to keep going instead of stopping to check-in with myself, that anxiety escalated to avoiding my emails like the plague and taking impromptu breaks off social media that lasted days, even weeks.

It all came crashing down when my housing situation changed and I had to move elsewhere. Despite packing up and getting rid of furniture, I continued to sustain my presence to be at every event I could because I thought that they were too important to miss. I felt compelled to hang onto every word spoken by Cecilia Gentili and other prominent community leaders. One day, as I prepared for a long day ahead to attend a rally in Washington Square, what was intended to be a power nap quickly became sleeping in until evening fell. My body had finally shut down on me.

Since then, I found myself so hesitant to attend events that I wasn’t seen in public for a while outside of Instagram. I had so much to do to prepare for my move that I had to, for the first time in a while, prioritize my own needs. The break was very much needed but my time spent sharing space within activism circles had made me feel like this was an act of selfishness. An unspoken expectation of martyrdom settled deep in my mind as I watched fellow activists constantly volunteer their time. That expectation would often whisper: shame on you for putting yourself first when there was so much injustice against your community.

Despite that sentiment lingering in my mind for years, I eventually gleaned insights through personal conversations from seasoned veterans who have been in the activist sphere longer than I had been alive. I recently recall having a conversation over the phone with my mother, Tabytha, who was also a trans activist in New York City. We had spent an hour engaged in conversation over the phone about getting our messages across to the people and finding balance in the work. By the end of it, we both had reached a mutual understanding that rest is not only needed to sustain the work; it was also a radical act of resistance against a system that looks to desensitize us to the senseless violence and overwhelm our nervous systems to keep us frozen in place.

While the work we do is important, how do we make space for rest to continue engaging ourselves in it?

Due to the subjective nature of this question, no one could answer this for me. Other activists could only speak on what they know worked for them. So I sat down one day after work, opened up my laptop and wrote out a list of questions to reflect on what rest meant to me. Through freehand writing, I figured out that rest meant:

• Re-engaging in hobbies I enjoyed in the past such as watching anime, reading nonfiction and immersing myself in Brazilian Portuguese (Oi, tudo bem?).

• Setting boundaries around activism, learning to say no more often and reserving yes for the right things.

• Scheduling dates with friends, often fellow activists, acknowledging their humanity by checking in with them and having conversations.

• Reframing breaks as productive instead of lazy, resisting the temptation to compare myself to others who are still fully engaged in activism.

Reflection Questions

If you are an activist and find yourself constantly fatigued or overextending, no matter if you are fighting for transgender rights or engaging in environmental justice, here are some questions to reflect on:

1. What motivates me to engage in activism?

   1. Does my activism align with my strengths and passions or am I overcommitting in ways that drain my energy?

2. What does intentional rest mean to me?

   1. What hobbies and practices bring joy into my life?

3. What support systems, habits, or boundaries do I need to sustain my activism long-term?

4. How do I feel when I step back from activism? Relief, guilt, or something else?

5. How can I reframe rest as productive and necessary rather than feeling guilty about it?

   1. What can I change or replace in my daily life to make space for intentional rest?

6. What are my working hours to answer emails, text messages and other communication channels?

7. What commitments drain me the most?

   1. How can I set boundaries to protect my energy?

   2. What will I say no to in order to say yes to the right things?

These questions will serve to get you started in figuring out what your needs are. Activism may impact how the world moves around us and we can be a part of that change—but we must also give ourselves grace and space when our capacity is limited.

If we don’t take good care of ourselves, who will?

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