Hello! I am Dr. Amanda Malak (she/her/we/us) with Malak Psychology on the Xalychidom Piipash (Pima) and Akimel O’Odham (Maricopa) people’s land more commonly known as Phoenix, Arizona, USA. I would like to wish you all a Happy Arab Heritage Month! I find it intensely important for us to honor our histories and honor the current history that we are going through. Collectively liberate one another, be together through dance, music, literature, poetry, and more. Therapy is a beautiful space to process our trauma and all that we are living through, but it is not enough. Our ancestors were storytellers, there’s so much mythology for us to lean in on. I have tea here (grab my tea cup), our tea rituals are that time to just be together, to feel, to garden. I have a Gaza Garden, and the poppies which represent the martyrs have just started blooming. Connect to the land, connect to our ancestral foods, connect to our people, our languages, even those that are colonized – I am speaking a colonized language right now (English and some Arabic as Coptic is my indigenous language), it’s okay as it is the language I have for now. Insha’allah (in God’s will), we can connect to each other, survive, and allow the stories to live on about the hardships we are witnessing. I just want to honor all of my Arab, SWANA, or MENA, whatever you want to call yourself (SWANA = Southwest Asian and North African; MENA = Middle Eastern and North African), colleagues and humans, plants, animals, lands, and waters that are in suffering. I pray for peace for all of us, thank you so much for being here with me, and thank you for being on this Earth with me in this moment. 

#arabheritagemonth #psychology #swana #mena #arab @inclusivetherapists #swanapsychologist #mentalhealth #liberation