Untangling Ourselves

When voices resonate together, it’s not just to make music. That resonance can shake loose our bodies, our emotions, our relationships, and our power. Lee Hoffman is a professor of vocal music, choir director, and singer whose compassion, humility, and insight create spaces safe enough for everyone to use their voice. CW: Mentions of CSA, genocide, feminicide, anti-LGBTQ hate crimes Episode artwork "Medicine Series" by Kill Joy from the Justseeds graphics collection. Time stamps 3:24 Choir culture, safety and sound 14:14 Lee’s childhood in high control Christian churches 17:50 – 19:10 discussion of child sexual assault and religion 19:11 Homophobia, bullying and love as survival 26:54 Teaching voice and anti-racism 44:23 Singing as the doorway 49:09 Cathy Roma 52:19 Non-coercive leadership 1:02:58 Voice as anti-fascism 1:12:17 Silence as being with Links Lee Hoffman All Voices Choral Project Peace and Justice Choir Peace for Gaza by Katie Ailes Joan Baez “I am Noise” “Watch and Pray” sung by Tamara-Lynn Richards Cathy Roma Parker J Palmer A Hidden Wholeness Unschooling “All of Us” from Considering Matthew Shepard, Craig Hella Johnson AVCP Listen to Herstory: Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Khadijah Britton Search group Lila Downs “Cariñito” Canción sin miedo Poor People’s Campaign Support Untangling Ourselves by contributing to their tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/untangling-ourselves Find out more at https://untanglingourselves.com This podcast is powered by Pinecast.Read transcript

Supriya Narang is a play practitioner, witch, neurodivergent unschooling mom, soap artist, and community organizer. Supriya shares how the expectations and humiliations of motherhood changed her personally and professionally. She offers practical tips about community building, a feminist manifesto on neurodivergent motherhood, and a guiding principle of trusting—and seeing—the most marginalized people in our communities. https://www.instagram.com/thismum.life/ wellbeingwithsupriya at gmail.com Time stamps: 1:16 Neurodivergent community building 14:24 Play therapy 24:06 From corporate a**hole to feminist humility 41:02 Conflict and inclusion Support Untangling Ourselves by contributing to their tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/untangling-ourselves Find out more at https://untanglingourselves.com This podcast is powered by Pinecast.Read transcript

Rayne shares a story about inner conflict, growing up autistic and surrounded by both disability rights advocacy and evangelical Christianity. They decided early on to “just take the demerit”: discovering that although it may sting, liberation is possible when—in an oppressive system of high control religion, ableism, and patriarchy—you decide to just get on with what you believe is right, regardless of all the ways the people in charge tell you that you’re wrong. Rayne is an ASL interpreter, consultant, and parenting coach, whose work is continuously informed by the Disability Justice principles and in particular disabled Black, indigenous, and people of color’s perspectives. “We can disagree and still love each other, unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.” -- Robert Jones Jr. 2:19 Learning ASL 23:04 Leaving Evangelical Christianity 34:34 Identifying as disabled and autistic 41:57 Learning disability justice 58:54 Practicing disability justice principles Rayne Depukat: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rayne-depukat/ Disability Justice Principles: https://sinsinvalid.org/10-principles-of-disability-justice/ Heather Watkins: https://slowwalkersseemore.com/https://slowwalkersseemore.com/ Robert Jones at Son of Baldwin: https://sonofbaldwin.com/https://sonofbaldwin.com/ Robert Jones' substack, "Witness": https://robertjonesjr.substack.com/ New Hampshire-Manchester ASL Interpreting Program: https://manchester.unh.edu/program/bs/aslenglish-interpreting-major More on disability justice: https://stimpunks.org/glossary/disability-justice/ Review of research on fathers of children: https://academic.oup.com/jdsde/article/26/2/187/6102075 Research on hearing parents learning ASL: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10785677/ This podcast is powered by Pinecast.Read transcript

CW: References to child sexual abuse, religious abuse, and death due to systemic vulnerability. Podcast cover image by Dave Lowenstein, used under Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs CC BY-NC-ND Creative Commons License via Justseeds. Modified with podcast text. Dandelion Seeds: https://sacdandelion.org 3:05 Andrea’s childhood catching lizards and being a good mormon 10:33 Why she was invested in Mormonism, and what made her leave 26:19 What is Mutual Aid and Dandelion Seeds’ work 37:35 Advice for getting involved and finding community Help for survivors of sexual assault https://www.childhelphotline.org/ https://protecteverychild.com/ https://rainn.org/ https://snapnetwork.org/resources-for-survivors/ https://www.revitalizewellnesscounseling.com/blog/csa-in-the-church For leaving high control religion Steve Hassan’s “BITE model” https://freedomofmind.com/cult-mind-control/bite-model-pdf-download/ National Domestic Violence hotline https://www.thehotline.org/ Also see notes on Ep. 1 with Delia Other mutual aid resources: https://sacramentohomelessunion.org/ https://foodnotbombs.net/new_site/ https://www.radical-guide.com/listing/punks-with-lunch-sacramento-chapter/ https://www.sac-soup.org/ https://www.facebook.com/SactoPPC/ https://www.norcalresist.org/index.html https://www.deanspade.net/mutual-aid-building-solidarity-during-this-crisis-and-the-next/ More about Dandelion Seeds https://linktr.ee/dandelionseeds916 Dandelion Seeds is a grassroots mutual aid group working to provide food, water, survival gear, harm reduction, first aid supplies, and other small comforts to our unhoused neighbors in South Sacramento. We (Dandelion Seeds) do street meals on average twice a month, with supplementary runs in extreme weather conditions and for special occasions. We hand out home cooked meals, water, blankets and sleeping bags, Narcan, baby wipes and other hygiene supplies, tents, tarps, socks, hats, gloves, flashlights, first aid, condoms, harm reduction kits, books, reading glasses, pet food, firewood, and more. In addition to material needs, we make an effort to connect with the communities we serve. We spend time getting to know people, their families, their pets. We help with some basic veterinary triage and first aid, give basic general advice on pet and personal care. We listen. In 2025, Dandelion seeds handed out 2,571 meals, 4,258 bottles of water, 790 electrolyte or hot drinks, 95 tarps, 34 tents, 485 packs of wipes, 64 blankets or sleeping bags, 1,020 doses of Narcan, 1,529 harm reduction kits, 311 first aid packs, 11,129 condoms, 1,248 maxi pads, 2,236 tampons, 4,575 pairs of socks, 1,054 hygiene packs, 100 storm kits, 75 emergency food bags, and 50 hot weather comfort kits. We did 38 street outreach days in 2025, with 8 street team volunteers backed by a team of support from volunteers at home, cooking, sewing, knitting, building outreach kits, sourcing supplies, and, of course, making our work possible with money and supply donations. We’re back at it already this year, with 6 street meals scheduled in the first 3 months of 2026. If you want to get involved, send us a message! Or if you want to help with funding, there’s two ways to get money to us. The fast way is to send PayPal as a “friends and family” transaction. That puts money directly into our working account. https://www.paypal.me/DandelionSeeds916?locale.x=en_US Alternately, if you’d like to make a tax deductible donation, and/or set up a recurring donation, you can use this link to the donation page set up by our fiscal sponsor, A Radical Guide. All of those funds, less the credit card processing fees, go to us. It’s a little bit slower, but it’s tax deductable, AND when you set up a recurring donation, it helps us even more because it allows us to make plans for ongoing expenses https://www.radical-guide.com/dandelion-seeds/ And we’ve recently updated our wishlist. (We hate Amazon too, alas, they have the most functional wishlist feature for our needs. If you want to buy stuff for us from someplace else, get in touch and we’ll figure out the best way to make that work.) https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/2261OGZ8J8LBA?ref_=wl_share Let it begin with each step we take, and let it begin with each change we make, and let it begin with each chain we break, and let it begin every time we awake.

CW addresses gun violence Podcast cover image by Landon Sheely, used under Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs CC BY-NC-ND Creative Commons License via Justseeds, modified with podcast title text. Support the artist here. 1:46 Statement from Becca Good published in the Minnesota Star Tribune 4:39 “On Learning to Dissect Fetal Pigs” by Renee Nichole Macklin Good, read by Andrea Schrimp 7:06 “Good” by Andrea Schrimp Sources: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/01/09/renee-goods-wife-releases-statement-about-ice-shooting https://poets.org/2020-on-learning-to-dissect-fetal-pigs https://www.startribune.com/she-was-an-amazing-human-being-mother-identifies-woman-shot-killed-by-ice-agent/601559922 Where to donate: Monarca Rapid Response line https://monarcamn.org/ https://givebutter.com/mntogether https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-south-high-school-families From Ashley Horan, UU clergy on the ground in Minneapolis: https://www.facebook.com/ashley.a.p.horan/posts/pfbid041T5hNt4Ro7YV4BiDWjYL6vD88PzrtEn4HJB7YHhtvq311sjvC1utyCsDe9tBmt1l MIRAC - Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee https://www.miracmn.com/ CTUL https://www.facebook.com/CTULucha Interfaith Coalition on Immigration (ICOM) https://mnicom.org/ MARCH https://www.marchminnesota.org/ United Renters for Justice - InquilinXs UnidXs por Justicia https://www.inquilinxsunidxs.org/ Unidos MN https://unidos-mn.org/ CAIR-Minnesota (CAIR-MN) http://www.cairmn.com Immigrant Law Center Minnesota https://www.ilcm.org/donate/ Immigrant Defense Network https://immigrantdefensenetwork.org/donate/ https://monarcamn.org/ Further Reading: https://www.facebook.com/amightygirl/posts/pfbid0kKXgAJ13tkwKMqAcmJmFxnvsiB1aB2XGn9NPBmj6219JM8jp6rkGGkmbfMFz7wmyl https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/09/white-house-minneapolis-ice-killing https://www.404media.co/dhs-is-lying-to-you-about-ice-shooting-a-woman/

Show Notes Ep 4: More K-Pop with Rob Cunningham How does an experimental music aficionado become a K-pop fan? Always on the search for mind-blowing sound (see part one of his story in Epiosde 3), Rob reoriented to fun and living in the present during the pandemic. This led him to K-pop and its spectacular, dramatic audiovisual abundance. We talk about K-pop’s relationship to 80s music, Rob's favorite bands, originality, whiteness, politics, and joy as a compass. You can find playlists and reviews at his blog: https://theaquamarinelayer.blogspot.com/ Or on mastadon at: @[email protected] -- 1:54 Pandemic reset 5:10 Intro to K-pop via homeschool conference 9:53 Twice 19:48 Diving into the deep end 24:05 Connection to past music genres 28:34 Functional versus spectacle aesthetics 33:26 Girls Generation “The Boys” as a quantum leap 38:32 Fandoms and politics 47:54 K-Pop Dreaming podcast 53:32 Joy as a compass -- Key links K-pop homeschool: https://www.instagram.com/kpophomeschool/ Twice “Jelly Jelly”: https://youtu.be/WuLQ5iV3Q64 Dreamcatcher: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QD0FeZyDtQ Red Velvet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBnGBb1wg98 Girls Generation “I got a boy”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wq7ftOZBy0E About “I got a boy”: https://web.archive.org/web/20230120020946/https://www.mtv.com/news/nol58l/girls-generation-i-got-a-boy-new-retro K-Pop Dreaming Podcast: https://laist.com/podcasts/california-love Maid: https://www.netflix.com/title/81166770 -- More links Homeschool conference: https://www.hsc.org/ YP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JYP_Entertainment Itzy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zndvqTc4P9I Black pink: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2S24-y0Ij3Y Ministry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2MH5c2sTvc Guy Debord: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectacle_(critical_theory) Girls Generation “The Boys”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pA_Tou-DPI Exo “Mama”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KH6ZwnqZ7Wo Loona https://youtu.be/zW-AIXAnLcE NewJeans https://youtu.be/js1CtxSY38I On BTS “Not Today”: https://muish.wordpress.com/2015/12/06/bts-baepsae-english-translation-ramblings/ Politics: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/22/arts/music/k-pop-fans-trump-politics.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4E8.mhXf.l7jYUvwCUm-q\&smid=url-share “Flawless”: https://www.npr.org/2023/05/22/1177477181/beauty-culture-in-south-korea-reveals-a-grim-future-in-flawless K-pop and feminism: https://web.archive.org/web/20211213160637/https://catapult.co/stories/dear-irene-im-still-learning-how-to-be-a-feminist-too-k-pop-fan-giaae-kwon

Show Notes for Ep 3: Pure Sound with Rob Cunningham Rob has been searching for innovative, mind-blowing sounds ever since he was a little kid watching MTV in 1980s suburban Los Angeles. He tells his story of searching through rap, goth, metal, punk, industrial, electronic, experimental, 80s, and classical music. In part two we'll talk about kpop. You can find playlists and reviews at his blog: https://theaquamarinelayer.blogspot.com/ Or on mastadon at: @[email protected] -- 2:10 Thriller, Gangster Rap, Punk, Goth, Industrial, Electronic 5:53 Nine Inch Nails 7:45 Subcultures 14:08 Accessing music 18:11 Usenet, the changing internet, lull in the 2000s 22:02 “Have your kids shocked you with their music?” 26:55 KDVS radio 28:51 Losing a sense of direction in the musical archive 32:45 Pop sneaks in: 80s, Taylor Swift, and Spice Girls 40:22 Fandoms 44:20 The search for pure sound vs. big productions -- Key links Thriller: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOnqjkJTMaA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Jackson%27s_Thriller_(music_video)Run DMC https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19tjJ0G-8V4 Nine Inch Nails https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak7BQaaizlM Nurse with Wound https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1efx5baXO-4 Helene Grimaud https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujO9p1u70Ac KDVS: (22-23) www.kdvs.org Taylor Swift Reputation tour https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBk4xPhag-gT__wpprfT-7kTz7Wvl7oLF Spice World https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spice_World_(film) -- More links Beastie Boys https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkIB7YHbvc8 NWA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZuxPKUVGiw Eazy-E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYn6Vz9X0VQ Public Enemy https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLP1lC0FnuI0L5mKZdSVAazv8Os0gk82DX Merzbow https://merzbow.bandcamp.com/album/pulse-demon Aube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kpis9vRJmtM\&t=2313s Incapacitants https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSG3m5ujegA Autechre https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMT_NmagvZ8 Aphex Twin https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwAngCPxnHQ

Who is a "typical suburban mom"? And what if they were never taught to people please? I talk to Sue Patterson about showing up authentically, partnering with your kids, and using your voice—even when it’s shaky. In many different spaces, from facebook groups to the school cafeteria, Sue meets people where they are, right now. Sue is a coach and podcaster whose website, Unschooling Mom2Mom, offers an accessible entry point for new unschooling families. 2:19: Defining unschooling 7:10 Journey to unschooling and living in the present 19:39 Sue’s background as an outspoken kid and psychiatric nurse 24:08 Changing culture by creating Unschooling Mom2Mom 41:33 Political speech and the typical suburban mom 58:28 Sue’s guiding principals Unschooling Mom2Mom https://www.unschoolingmom2mom.com/ Sue’s podcast with quick unschooling tips https://www.unschoolingmom2mom.com/podcast Sue’s substack https://unschooling.substack.com/ Homeschooled Teens book https://www.unschoolingmom2mom.com/product/homeschooled-teens-book Strewing calendar https://www.unschoolingmom2mom.com/strewing-calendars Home Education Magazine https://openlibrary.org/works/OL9625942W/The_Homeschool_Reader The Unschooling Handbook: How to Use the Whole World as Your Child’s Curriculum Mary Griffith https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-unschooling-handbook-how-to-use-the-whole-world-as-your-child-s-classroom-mary-griffith/641440e51a6b16d8 John Taylor Gatto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Taylor_Gatto Pam Sarooshian https://livingjoyfully.ca/blog/2016/01/eu002-ten-questions-with-pam-sorooshian/

How does deprogramming from a Christian Campus Cult in the 1980s connect with supporting parents as they navigate neurodivergence today? Delia Tetelman shares her story. Deprogramming didn’t stop with leaving the cult, it’s helped her with parenting, unschooling, mental health, and disability justice. Delia and I are part of the admin team for a free support group, Unschooling Every Family. The group helps families who are just beginning to learn about ableism and non-coercion. https://unschoolingeveryfamily.com/ 2:17 What is Unschooling? 11:49 Delia’s background in a toxic family system and high control religion 20:48 Christian Campus Cult indoctrination in the 1980s 31:28 Deprogramming and the house of cards 46:05 Life after the cult 51:58 Reflective parenting 57:59 Neurodiversity and mentalization 1:09:28 The link between deprogramming and connection parenting Help with high control religion and coercive control: Steve Hassan’s “BITE model” https://freedomofmind.com/cult-mind-control/bite-model-pdf-download/ National Domestic Violence hotline https://www.thehotline.org/ Mentioned in this episode: Cults to Consciousness podcast https://www.youtube.com/c/CultstoConsciousness Maranatha https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maranatha_Campus_Ministries Peter Fonagy discussing mentalization on “The Life Scientific” https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000dpj2 Reflective Parenting https://www.reflectivecommunities.org/what-is-reflective-parenting Reflective Communication in unschooling and/or neurodivergence https://unschoolingeveryfamily.com/start-here/4/#guide-3-connection-parenting-reflective-parenting Treating Personality Disorders in Children and Adolescents A Relational Approach by Efrain Bleiberg https://www.guilford.com/books/Treating-Personality-Disorders-in-Children-and-Adolescents/Efrain-Bleiberg/9781593850180 Trauma Geek resources on the intersection of neurodiversity and mental health https://www.traumageek.com/ Rayne Depukat, neurodivergent and homeschooling coach, ASL translator https://www.linkedin.com/in/rayne-depukat/ Autistic Values https://neuroclastic.com/the-identity-theory-of-autism-values-are-not-opinions-to-autistics-we-are-our-values/ All Our Families: Disability Lineage and the Future of Kinship, by Jennifer Natalya Fink https://www.jennifernatalyafink.com/

Welcome to Untangling Ourselves What leads you in those moments when you realize, "You must change your life"? What joys, creative projects, values, or sense of purpose guide your next step and help you untangle yourself from bias and limiting beliefs? Coming soon. Archaic Torso of Apollo, by Rainer Maria Rilke