When Feeling Good Is a Threat to Power
Sunday, March 29 | 10AM CST | Live Online
A live, three-hour online convening for women and femme-presenting people committed to truth, liberation, and building joy as a lived, strategic practice.
The first 20 seats are free.
First come, first served.
This is a
No-Bullshit space
Joy Is Strategy was created to hold space for women and femme-presenting people committed to anti-racist work, liberation, and collective transformation.
We tell the truth.
We make room for shadow work.
We refuse harm while refusing respectability politics.
This is not passive consumption.
You will be invited into reflection, embodiment, and honest dialogue.
This is participatory strategy.
CLICK BELOW TO LEARN MORE
What You’ll Walk Away With
Political Clarity
A grounded understanding of why joy is not frivolous — it is strategic in this political moment.
Embodied Practice
Tools for integrating joy through movement, breath, and daily ritual.
Honest Dialogue
A brave space for real conversation without tone-policing, bypassing, or minimizing harm.
Kinship
Connection with other women committed to liberation work and collective thriving.
Choose Your Ticket Experience
The Truthteller
Live Access
Joy is Strategy Worksheet
($97 Value)
$27 (First 20 Tickets are Free)
The Strategist
The Liberator
Live access
Joy is Strategy Worksheet
Full replay
Language Matters Digital Course
Signed Copy of Hijacking Equity
($297 Value)
$107
Event
Schedule
March 29, 2026
10:00 AM – Opening & Framing – Dr. Arelia Johnson
10:15 AM – This Shit Is Not Normal – Dr. Anita Wadhwa
10:45 AM – The Shift – Claire Miller
11:15 AM – Joy in Singular – LaKeidru Blaylock
11:45 AM – Joy in the Everyday – Olusola Tribble
12:15 PM – Black Outside! – Fatima Bunafoor
12:45 PM – Joy is Noncompliance – Dr. Shantaé Motley-Hodges
1:15 PM – Closing & Call to Action – Dr. Arelia Johnson
Meet the Speakers
Claire Miller
Claire Miller is an Atlanta native with over twenty years in local government and youth development, shaped by her Peace Corps service in Guatemala and a deep curiosity about human dynamics.
She approaches joy as both an analytical framework and a lived practice, bringing strategic playfulness and intention to organizational culture and community spaces.
Her session, The Shift, explores how clarity and connection can transform systems from the inside out.
Dr. Anita Wadhwa
Dr. Anita Wadhwa is the Executive Director of Restorative Houston, where she trains a multigenerational network of practitioners committed to building community and repairing harm.
A descendant of Punjabi refugees, she developed an intergenerational restorative justice model called YAM
during her doctoral work at Harvard.
Her work bridges research and practice, centering restoration as both community infrastructure and cultural shift.
Olusola Tribble
Olusola Tribble is a cultural and racial equity educator and coach working at the intersection of imagination, culture, and institutional transformation.
With over two decades of experience across arts education, organizational development, and local government, she partners with public and nonprofit leaders to move equity from concept to lived practice.
Her work centers relational practice and systemic change as pathways toward collective liberation.
LaKeidru Blaylock
LaKeidru Blaylock is a visionary leader and strategist dedicated to strengthening families and transforming the systems that shape their well-being.
As Project Coordinator for the Texas Family Well-Being Initiative, she leads collaborative efforts across Houston and the state to advance prevention, equity, and family thriving.
Grounded in her lived experience and the belief that joy is strategic, her leadership centers healing, economic stability, and relational well-being as foundations for sustainable change.
Fatima Bunafoor
Fatima Bunafoor is an equity and management professional whose work spans human rights, racial justice, and systems accountability across local and global contexts.
Born in Bahrain and shaped by the Arab Spring, she has dedicated her career to advancing equity in government and nonprofit institutions, informed by her lived experience as a Black, multiracial, Middle Eastern immigrant.
Her work reflects a deep belief that addressing inequity is integral to collective growth and community transformation.
Dr. Shantaé Motley-Hodges
Dr. Shantaé M. Motley-Hodges is a prevention scientist, researcher, and educator with over a decade of experience advancing systems change across juvenile justice and child welfare.
Her work centers trauma-informed practice, primary prevention, and equity-driven accountability, translating data into strategies that reduce system involvement and disrupt punishment culture. She is committed to building systems rooted in healing, collective responsibility, and liberation.
MEET THE FOUNDER
Dr. Arelia Johnson
Dr. Arelia Johnson is a criminologist, playwright, and founder who has spent her career turning the impossible into structural change. A daughter of Sunnyside, Houston and a first-generation scholar, she architected Harris County’s first Office of Human and Civil Rights and now serves on the National Steering Committee for the Government Alliance on Race and Equity.
Her framework, Joy Is Strategy, was forged inside real institutions and real life. Her forthcoming book, Hijacking Equity and the Fight for Justice, challenges leaders to reclaim equity as both language and practice.
Hijacking Equity
Dr. Johnson's new book, Hijacking Equity and the Fight for Justice, is in included with the Liberator tickets. This book is a field guide for truth-tellers and freedom-builders standing in the fire. In a political moment where "equity" has been rebranded as a threat, Dr. Arelia Johnson exposes how language itself has been weaponized. With clarity and conviction, Johnson calls for a new framework: Distributive Justice-an approach that refuses neutrality, demands accountability, and rebuilds power where it was stolen.
The First 20 Seats Are Free
We believe access matters. The first twenty people to register will receive full access to the live convening at no cost.
After that, tiered tickets unlock additional experiences including replay access, signed copies of the book, a guided journal, and a private session with Arelia.
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