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My Body is Not a Prayer Request
with Amy Kenny
What embodied wisdom do disabled bodies have to share?
Today I am joined by disabled scholar, activist, and author Dr. Amy Kenny to talk about precisely that. Amy will share lessons from her own experience of having a disabled body, particularly living into the Unknown. She’ll explain why it’s so important for all of us to dismantle ableism–and how it shows up in capitalism, patriarchy, and even perfectionism! The idea that there is one perfect body, one ideal way of being in the world she names as “eugenic.” Instead, Amy says, disabled bodies remind us that there are different ways of being human, of being divine image bearers–and that difference should not just be tolerated, but celebrated.
Join us for a candid conversation about Amy Kenny’s forthcoming book, My Body is Not a Prayer Request: Disability Justice in the Church, which will be released on May 17, 2022. To learn more about Amy, visit www.amy-kenny.com.
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:40:03
Kelly Deutsch
Hi, everyone. Kelly Deutsch here, and welcome to our next episode on the Spiritual Wanderlust podcast. Today I am joined by Amy Kenney, and Amy is a disabled scholar and a Shakespeare lecturer who hates hamlet. Her work has been featured in The Mighty and Roxane Gays, The Audacity, sojourners, and Freedom Road podcast. Kenny serves on the Mayor's Diversity, equity and Inclusion Task Force in California, coordinates support for people experiencing homelessness in her neighborhood, and is currently co launching Jubilee Homes OC, a permanent supportive housing initiative in her local community.
00:00:40:06 - 00:01:00:18
Kelly Deutsch
Her forthcoming book, My Body Is Not a Prayer Request Disability Justice in the church, comes out in May of 2022, and so I am excited to have Amy here with us today to talk a little bit about ableism, her upcoming book, and I'd also love to talk to you a little bit about writing as well. So, Amy, thanks for joining us.
00:01:00:20 - 00:01:02:08
Amy Kenny
Thanks so much for having me, Kelly.
00:01:02:11 - 00:01:14:12
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, absolutely. before we dive in, I know you mentioned earlier that you're calling in from California and that you've lived in many places. what would you say is your favorite place that you've lived so far?
00:01:14:14 - 00:01:35:19
Amy Kenny
Ooh. Tough question. I like to say that I have, two passports and no real nationality. I am from Australia. I've lived in London and Canada and here in California, and I think my favorite place is anywhere I can snuggle up with a book.
00:01:36:09 - 00:02:05:04
Kelly Deutsch
That sounds nice. That's a wonderful way to feel at home. Just about anywhere. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Well, I'd love to start with your book, because the title of your book totally grabbed me the first time that I heard it. my body is not a prayer request, and I find that quite the evocative title. And I was curious if you could tell us a little bit about, how this book came about, what prompted it and inspired it, and how it came to be.
00:02:05:06 - 00:02:33:12
Amy Kenny
Yeah, thanks. So the title is really based on my life. This I am disabled. I use a wheelchair and a cane and walk kind of oscillate between all of those and growing up disabled and in church spaces. I think a lot of people really well-meaning, really lovely, but would definitely treat my body as though it were beckoning them over to pray, to, recommend remedies.
00:02:33:13 - 00:03:03:11
Amy Kenny
You know, I'm just one essential oil away from leaping and running, you know, and I think there was a lot of great intentions there. But ultimately, it was very much rooted in this idea that disability is bad, less than some sort of defect. And so the book is telling a lot of my own story in church spaces of people trying to pray me away, or people trying to cure me or fix me.
00:03:03:13 - 00:03:31:10
Amy Kenny
And it's inviting the church and, you know, other communities, really just to think about how disability is part of the beautiful diversity of humanity. And we need to kind of get away from this idea that disabled people are seeking cures, because not all of us are, and away from the idea that that is really anyone's business, but that disabled person, or who they consent to share that with.
00:03:31:13 - 00:03:49:23
Amy Kenny
And so the book is really shining a light on my own lived experience, and then inviting others into it and inviting others to think about disability through kind of a new way, where it's part of, the beautiful diversity instead of something that needs to be cured or fixed.
00:03:51:27 - 00:04:12:07
Kelly Deutsch
One thing that comes to mind for me, I so I was in a convent for a number of years and I had my life fall apart with some pretty severe illness and so I was mostly bedridden for about 18 months. And I similarly experienced that, you know, where everybody's like, you're just, you know, this pill, this supplement to this, like alternative health care therapy.
00:04:12:08 - 00:04:35:13
Kelly Deutsch
Have you checked your vitamin D levels? You know, like one thing away from, you know, being fixed or cured and what what I realized during that time is, it seemed a little backwards, but it made sense to me how essentially my my suffering, my illness, whatever I was struggling with was making someone else feel uncomfortable and powerless, really.
00:04:35:21 - 00:04:50:09
Kelly Deutsch
And their own discomfort with their powerlessness is often what prompted their well-meaning intention. You know, of trying to fix me, advise me, help me. Even though most of these people, you know, it's like either I didn't know at all or had not asked for.
00:04:50:09 - 00:04:51:18
Speaker 3
Help or.
00:04:51:20 - 00:05:12:08
Kelly Deutsch
Anything of that sort. and so I find that interesting. How much? just how much? That's an invitation for all of us to recognize our own powerlessness, you know, in our own discomfort that we're feeling and work on that instead of needing to, kindly inflict that.
00:05:12:08 - 00:05:14:24
Speaker 3
On another person.
00:05:15:13 - 00:05:37:15
Amy Kenny
yeah. Do your own work. Don't work it out on my body. You know. Right. And I think disabled bodies, chronically ill bodies, anybody that is any way outside of the norm really becomes public property. It's this idea that people think that they have the right to manage it or control it, or really ask invasive questions that are completely inappropriate.
00:05:37:15 - 00:05:59:09
Amy Kenny
You know, just be at the library or at the grocery store and someone will be asking me about all kinds of medical trauma that I've endured. And it's that's not appropriate. You know, and I think on top of that, we do become a type of mirror to reflect other's discomfort. You know, I am living my best life.
00:05:59:09 - 00:06:27:20
Amy Kenny
I'm out here enjoying myself, and people will come up to me with a lot of pity and side glances and a really high pitched tone and a cocked head. You know, and this idea of, oh, you poor thing, you're disabled and I feel sorry for you. Hang in there, you know, and there's lots of phrases like, hang in there, or at least you have someone to take care of you or, you know, things like that that I, I'm actually doing just fine, thank you.
00:06:27:22 - 00:06:32:25
Kelly Deutsch
Right, right. Like, they have to reframe it for you because they just assume that.
00:06:32:28 - 00:06:33:27
Speaker 3
You know, this is.
00:06:33:29 - 00:07:05:23
Kelly Deutsch
This is really difficult for you. And it's like I'm actually okay with my, you know, speaking for myself and my illness, I'm I've accepted my suffering. Like, it sounds like you're the one who is more uncomfortable, but that's the moment. yeah. What other kinds of things do you run across? Either yourself or. You've heard a lot in the disabled community of people who really are well intentioned, but is actually really kind of, rude or insensitive or just doesn't feel good when it is received.
00:07:05:25 - 00:07:15:12
Amy Kenny
Yeah, it's something I get a lot when I'm out with my husband is people will come up to him and say, oh, you're such an angel for staying with her.
00:07:15:19 - 00:07:17:11
Speaker 3
Oh, you know.
00:07:17:13 - 00:07:48:06
Amy Kenny
I mean, so many things wrong with that. and he is a kind human, but not because I'm disabled. Just because he happens to be a kind human. that's one that I get a lot. I get a lot. Good for you for getting out here, or you're such an inspiration or, these ideas of, well, you're my hero because you got out of bed this morning, you know, and I think all of that comes from a really lovely place.
00:07:48:06 - 00:08:13:09
Amy Kenny
And people are just projecting their own discomfort because they don't know what to say, and they don't have very much practice with disabled people. You know, one fourth of the population here in the United States. So it's actually kind of sad that there isn't very much practice or comfort talking about disability or talking to and with disabled people, but I think that that's what comes out a lot with these kind of euphemisms.
00:08:13:11 - 00:08:19:06
Amy Kenny
Another really popular one is handi capable or special needs.
00:08:20:02 - 00:08:45:01
Amy Kenny
My needs aren't special. When I go to a restaurant, I want somewhere to pee. I'm sure you do, too. When you know I want to love and be loved. That's not a special need. That's a deeply human need to want to belong. So I think just this idea that I am a full and capable human being is something that a lot of these euphemisms kind of reveal.
00:08:46:20 - 00:08:56:12
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. Makes me think of, one of my gay friends was saying that he was, you know, out walking hand in hand with his partner, you know, and occasionally he'll, he'll also get like a good for you.
00:08:56:12 - 00:09:03:16
Speaker 3
You know, and he's like really I think he thinks I guess. Yeah. Like okay.
00:09:03:18 - 00:09:09:08
Amy Kenny
Yeah, yeah. You're too young to be disabled. You're too pretty to be disabled. I mean, I've had them all.
00:09:09:10 - 00:09:14:22
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, I know it's funny being in the convent. I would get that for being a nun. You're too young to be a nun.
00:09:14:24 - 00:09:17:27
Speaker 3
You're too pretty to be a nun. That's like.
00:09:18:00 - 00:09:19:24
Kelly Deutsch
I'm not sure how to take that.
00:09:19:26 - 00:09:20:06
Speaker 3
Like.
00:09:20:06 - 00:09:22:08
Amy Kenny
Yeah. Do you say thank you to you?
00:09:22:08 - 00:09:32:08
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, yeah. Not sure. Do you have suggestions for. I mean, should people say anything at all? I mean, a lot of them are trying to be kind.
00:09:32:11 - 00:09:33:06
Speaker 3
You know, but.
00:09:34:08 - 00:09:45:21
Kelly Deutsch
it doesn't land that way necessarily. Do you have recommendations how to shift or should they just, like, send over some good energy and call it good?
00:09:45:24 - 00:10:08:07
Amy Kenny
I think treat us as you would any other human being in your life. So if you are someone who does talk to strangers, cool. You can talk to disabled strangers, but you know, really do that that work internally of thinking, would I say this if the person wasn't disabled? Would I say to any random couple, good for you for being a couple?
00:10:08:07 - 00:10:34:25
Amy Kenny
Probably not. I am acknowledging that there's something different about this person. I think also something people can do is really check their own language with words like lame. You know, lame is a slur and that's, it it means someone who doesn't walk or has some sort of defect in their leg. And so I'm lame. A lot of times people say it just without thinking or even connecting it to the disability community.
00:10:35:02 - 00:10:48:11
Amy Kenny
So I think it's more that kind of internal work I'd love for people to do rather than coming up to me. And, you know, when I'm just at target and telling me a bunch of euphemisms about my life that I didn't ask for, nor do I really want.
00:10:48:13 - 00:11:16:26
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, yeah. Because it almost. Yeah. The implication of there being something wrong with a disabled body, with an ill body, with with any kind of body, honestly, that's just outside of the norm. And, I'm curious, that also has to do with this general topic of ableism. And for those who are less familiar with that ism, I was wondering if you could share a little bit how you might define that.
00:11:16:28 - 00:11:52:00
Amy Kenny
Yeah, I think that ableism is any time we are placing value on people's bodies or minds that are based on productivity, independence, excellence, normalcy, intelligence, and that really comes to us from a definition from T.L. Lewis. And they talk about how it's rooted in eugenics, colonialism, anti-Blackness, and we can see roots of that in all of those isms as well, can't we?
00:11:52:03 - 00:12:17:21
Amy Kenny
I think, you know, what does that mean day to day kind of ground level. I think what it means is it can be anything from paying people who are disabled. Subminimum wage. That's still legal in many states in the US. It can be, disabled people not having the right to parent their own children. That's still legal in many states in the US forcing disabled people into poverty.
00:12:17:21 - 00:12:55:16
Amy Kenny
You can't, get married or have more than $2,000 if you collect disability in the US. So we don't have marriage equality, pay parity, you know, the rights of parents and children, all of those things are obviously ableism because they're discrimination against people just because their body mind is outside of the norm. But I think day to day where it shows up and and so all of these examples, we just talked about those euphemisms, saying slurs like lame or talking about something is crippling when it's not actually physically crippling.
00:12:55:18 - 00:13:28:27
Amy Kenny
I think ableism also shows up in a lot of assumptions around what I can and can't do, just because I use wheels often. So yesterday at a coffee shop, you know, I roll up and immediately the barista looks at the person I'm with instead of me of what would she like to order, you know, and just this kind of assumption of condescension and this assumption that I am incapable of expressing my own needs or desires, or I'm incapable or less than somehow just because I'm rolling instead of walking.
00:13:29:03 - 00:13:36:09
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, yeah, that you're less than human like that. That's so totally strange to me.
00:13:36:11 - 00:13:36:28
Speaker 3
Like.
00:13:37:00 - 00:13:37:23
Amy Kenny
Exactly.
00:13:37:23 - 00:13:45:01
Kelly Deutsch
That's part of that. That's part of your experience, you know? Wow. Yeah. You were literally just sitting instead of.
00:13:45:01 - 00:13:45:14
Speaker 3
Like.
00:13:45:14 - 00:13:50:00
Kelly Deutsch
Being upright, you know? I mean, it's another thing that we're, like, so doing right now.
00:13:50:03 - 00:13:50:28
Speaker 3
Yeah, exactly.
00:13:50:28 - 00:14:15:15
Kelly Deutsch
I mean, it's one thing if someone's like, in a coma and is, like, literally physically incapable of speaking, but it's like a whole nother ballgame. Yeah. When. Wow, wow. That's I'm sure there are plenty of situations that you've been in that the rest of us would find shocking, and people who are perhaps doing it have no idea that it's coming across quite the way it is.
00:14:15:18 - 00:14:51:21
Amy Kenny
Yeah. And even even coming up to someone, whether you're in a spiritual context or not, coming up to them and saying that, you know, God told me to pray for you or I want to pray away your disability. You know, I think when I'm my best self, I think that that is probably being faithful to some notion of, you know, I want to heal or something like that, but actually what it's doing is it's saying that I am worth less than you and that I have something wrong with me that you are going to fix.
00:14:51:23 - 00:15:16:09
Amy Kenny
And there's a lot of savior complex in that. I think there's a lot of assumptions around where I'm at with my disability and with my body. And I think there's also a strange way that you're kind of putting yourself in a position of, you know, I know what's best for this person, or I'm some sort of god in some way to come over to them, telling them, I need to pray you away.
00:15:16:12 - 00:15:36:24
Amy Kenny
Not all disabled people looking for a cure, not all of us want our disabilities gone. you know, we're obviously not a monolith because there's so many of us. But just to assume that someone doesn't want to be disabled and that you're going to pray it away in that moment, I think is is where it shows up a lot in kind of spiritual and church contexts.
00:15:37:29 - 00:16:05:13
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. That that savior complex is so crazy, you know, because it, it ends up I think that honestly has to do with the tendencies of codependent codependence in Christianity and how that can sometimes, we feel like this compulsion to help, to fix, to serve. And sometimes, if it's not well-received, you know, the codependent person will sometimes get upset, like, well, she didn't want my help.
00:16:05:20 - 00:16:08:10
Speaker 3
You know, like, been that.
00:16:08:12 - 00:16:36:03
Kelly Deutsch
Right? Right. Which is so backwards. It's like, okay, well, who who or what is this about really? and the other thing that strikes me as you, as you're sharing is, how how some of us, whatever, whether it's a disability or just a body that's outside of the norm, it's like our our, I don't even know what to call them.
00:16:36:05 - 00:17:04:03
Kelly Deutsch
Let's call them foibles. The things that are outside the norm are very much on display, you know? And so it's, like, transparent. And so people can easily come up and be like, oh, I need to pray for you, you know, whereas, like, I don't know, you might be having an affair or this other person might be like suicidal or, you know, there's so many other interior things that aren't, made physically manifest in a way that the whole world can see them, you know, whereas some of us just have to live.
00:17:04:03 - 00:17:34:10
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, like, okay, so sometimes I use a wheelchair or like, sometimes, you know, like being, living with some chronic illness, having other friends who are in that same thing, you know, where it's like a friend has a fibromyalgia flare up or, you know, just all sorts of different things that, make it so much more apparent. And you can't you can't hide it like you can some other quirks of our bodies and our our psyches or our emotions or brain and body chemistry.
00:17:34:10 - 00:17:42:04
Kelly Deutsch
So it, it's just a different way of living.
00:17:42:07 - 00:18:19:25
Amy Kenny
Yeah. I think there's that's kind of what I mean when I say my body becomes public property is that it's visible, externalized people feel they have the right to comment on it. And then people, inevitably, as with all property, feel like they get to own it or control it or manipulate it in some way. and there's such a tremendous amount of emotional and invisible labor that goes into being disabled, not around even my own embodiment, but around managing other people, the people's expectations, other people's remedies, other people's well-meaning prayers.
00:18:19:25 - 00:18:45:14
Amy Kenny
And, you know, I don't want to be a Jack and be snapping at people all the time. But if that's the fifth, you know, prayerful person I have encountered in that afternoon at the library, it's exhausting, you know? And on top of that, the emotional and invisible labor of calling ahead to see if the place you're going has a ramp, seeing if they have an accessible bathroom.
00:18:45:14 - 00:19:12:25
Amy Kenny
You know, all of not only, churches not required to be Ada compliant because they fought against the Ada when it was first implemented. But, you know, other places out in public aren't aren't just necessarily Ada compliant, and there's no real enforcing of that outside of lawsuits. So there's a tremendous amount of invisible labor that goes into being disabled that actually has nothing to do with my body.
00:19:14:23 - 00:19:43:27
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. Yeah. I think about a lot of our insensitivity, rudeness comes just out of ignorance because we don't have friends that are either differently bodied or, you know, same with really any marginalized population. You know, I think growing up in South Dakota, which is so white, you know, like in high school, there was one black family in town, you know, and it wasn't like a town of 500.
00:19:43:27 - 00:20:08:23
Kelly Deutsch
This was a town of 20,000. So it's not like itty bitty, but we had like one black family in town and everybody knew, like, oh, the Davises, you know. and so it's easy, I think, to other someone and be like those people, those people with disabilities, those black people, those like queer people, you know, it's easy to keep them at arm's length because they're not they're not close enough like friends.
00:20:08:23 - 00:20:29:17
Kelly Deutsch
It's not just my friend Amy, you know, it's it's I think I've heard you, say before, like, treating treating people like a mascot or this, like, inspiration porn. You know, like, Amy's my disabled friend, you know, and, like, no marginalized person likes that, you know, at least to my knowledge, nobody likes to be the token black friend or your token gay friend.
00:20:29:20 - 00:20:32:05
Kelly Deutsch
Like that just doesn't feel good.
00:20:32:07 - 00:20:52:11
Amy Kenny
Yeah, I'm everyone's one disabled friend. And that's awkward because it puts a lot of pressure on me to represent an entire community. And that's unfair. And how can one person represent the vibrancy and diversity of one fourth of the US population? That's just not possible.
00:20:52:16 - 00:20:53:03
Speaker 3
Yeah, but.
00:20:53:03 - 00:21:26:20
Amy Kenny
Also it's unfair because it puts that emotional labor back on me to do. Because if people haven't done their homework, if people just don't have very much proximity or experience with disabled people, it means that I'm constantly doing the work of educating on really basic stuff like, hey, please don't use that phrase in front of me or you know, does the restaurant you suggested that we're going to have a ramp, you know, those kind of things and that doubles that emotional and invisible labor that I have to do and makes it more exhausting.
00:21:26:22 - 00:21:29:13
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:21:29:15 - 00:21:59:25
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. I think just knowing that and finding more diverse populations, you know, to be friends with, whether it is, you know, bodies that are different than yours, or genders or whatever it is. I wanted to ask, though, to having not only a body that is disabled, but also being in church situations and, I'm assuming you you consider yourself a Christian.
00:22:00:09 - 00:22:28:17
Kelly Deutsch
most of our listeners, I would say at least half consider themselves Christians, but others are, you know, seekers of various sorts might not fall under any particular label. but I was curious how, your perception of, not only your personal experience, but also what you know and think and believe about bodies has affected your spirituality and what you think about God.
00:22:28:19 - 00:22:59:26
Amy Kenny
Yeah. In in so many deep ways, it has it's really interesting to me when someone says, well, who cares if you're disabled? You're a child of the king, you know? And I think, well, I mean, I care that I'm disabled and it actually impacts a lot of my day to day life. And also, I think in the Christian tradition, if we think about the incarnation, you know, bodies made up, our bodies matter the way that we live and the way that we are embodied, embodied matters.
00:22:59:29 - 00:23:23:07
Amy Kenny
I think it has being disabled has taught me a lot about interdependence of the whole community of creation. I think we have this myth here in the States that we can be independent and that we can just do it ourselves. And the stronger you are, the more that you can do, do yourself, and the more that you don't need anybody.
00:23:23:14 - 00:23:45:05
Amy Kenny
And obviously that's not true. And we know that that's not true just instinctively. But we already have a context for interdependence in so many ways. You know, I don't so all of my clothes I don't grow all of my food, I don't know how to create a cell phone. And yet I wear clothes, eat and use my cell phone every single day.
00:23:45:08 - 00:24:17:10
Amy Kenny
And we rely on one another for certain aspects. But when you rely on someone and you're disabled, that's somehow sad or weak. And I think we just need a shift in understanding that actually we are beings who are in community with one another and connected to one another, and that should deeply inform our whole spiritual lives. I think we shouldn't be trying to kind of outpace one another or become independent as a goal.
00:24:17:10 - 00:24:45:18
Amy Kenny
I don't see that in my understanding of God, my understanding of, creation in any way. I think another thing, it's really taught me about God is that I think about how disability is kind of a an embodiment or a form outside of the normative curve that shifts over time. My disability is dynamic. You know, some days I can get dressed by myself, other days I need help doing that.
00:24:45:20 - 00:25:19:11
Amy Kenny
And that reminds me a lot of what I know to be true about the different forms that the divine takes in our lives. and even, you know, throughout Scripture, God is burning bush and rock and lion and cloud and fire. God is in a pregnant, pregnant belly and a still small voice that's whispering. And that kind of shifting and changing physicality is very true to my experience of being disabled.
00:25:21:10 - 00:25:58:17
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. That's a lovely thing to meditate upon is I mean like the, the many faces of God or the shapes, the experiences. And I love that central city of the incarnation which I swear it's just I don't know how we forget that this is like the core of Christianity, but like how, how material is good, the body is good, nature creation, all of it is so good and is inhabited by the Holy, regardless of like its levels of functioning, you know, and it still reflects the holy.
00:25:59:28 - 00:26:32:19
Amy Kenny
yeah. And if you if you really believe that humans are made in the image of a creator who created all of creation, that that doesn't stop when someone's body works differently than someone else's. That doesn't make sense. Even if you think about the trajectory of an individual's life, many people become disabled by either age or accident. So are we saying that you lose the radiance and the vibrancy that you're projecting of the divine into the world when you age?
00:26:32:21 - 00:27:04:11
Amy Kenny
No, no one would say that. Yet that's often how disabled people are treated in church contexts. Is that I've heard discussions around, you know, does my disabled child even have a soul? You know, is my disabled child worth baptizing? Can my disabled child understand, read the gospel or fill in the blank? And it's such a limited, ableist view of disability that that's reflecting wow.
00:27:04:14 - 00:27:21:00
Kelly Deutsch
Wow. That's shocking. yeah. Makes my heart go out to like everyone who has to live through those kinds of marginal experience is, you know, just. Yeah.
00:27:21:08 - 00:27:30:18
Speaker 3
Wow. Wow.
00:27:30:20 - 00:27:53:16
Kelly Deutsch
I remember, I heard you also speak about this. It sounds like it kind of reflects this conversation we're having around God. And, it's changing nature. but also how how time is so different for those, or at least some of those with disability. And I was wondering if you could share a little bit about that.
00:27:53:19 - 00:28:25:19
Amy Kenny
Yeah. Crip time. So Crip time is, a concept of time that Allison Kafer and Ellen Samuels kind of developed and, and have written about. And basically it's the notion that time does not progress for disabled people in a predictable, unidirectional, linear, kind of fashion, but rather that time has to bend to the disabled body. So as soon as we hear that, I think people are suspicious.
00:28:25:19 - 00:28:55:03
Amy Kenny
What do you mean? How can that be? Because we all still can can see the time on our clocks. You know? But disabled bodies live outside of clocks and calendars. And what I mean by that is that there's no linear progression towards some fictitious notion of being non-disabled, that my body has been on throughout my life. So one day I, you know, need a lot of support putting socks on, the next day I can do it by myself.
00:28:55:06 - 00:29:25:27
Amy Kenny
There's no rhyme or reason for that. That's just part of being disabled in my particular disability. Disabled bodies experience this kind of fluidity of time where we don't necessarily know tomorrow what we can do, and there might not be enough spoons to kind of get us through that day. And there might be and there might, we might lose spoons halfway through the day, you know, and I think what's true about that is that it's actually true for everyone.
00:29:25:27 - 00:30:03:16
Amy Kenny
I think we're the canaries in the mine, if you think of it that way. Because no one knows what tomorrow holds. No one's promised tomorrow, and no one is promised how their body will function tomorrow. Many of us have probably had an experience where we have been grieving, and that's a type of emotional time travel, I think, where, you know, it's years after our loved one has passed and we get a whiff of that perfume and we're instantly transported to the day they died, and we're just emotionally back in that space.
00:30:03:18 - 00:30:25:23
Amy Kenny
And that's an experience of time that isn't really linear. It doesn't really follow this principle that over time things will get easier. The grief just shifts and changes, and you learn to live with it in a different way. And I think that's probably a good example of how it is to be disabled, and the kind of shifts and time travel that we do all the time.
00:30:26:06 - 00:30:59:09
Amy Kenny
and I think that has taught me so much about God and about my own wealth, because I am not defined by what I can accomplish today or by how many, you know, items I've checked off my to do list. As much as I would like to, I am. I have divine and eternal wealth outside of that, and I live in this script time that allows me to really be reminded that love is older than time.
00:31:05:10 - 00:31:29:07
Kelly Deutsch
Writing down notes. This is all good I and I think that's a really great analogy of grief, something that most or many people at least can relate to, where it just comes up out of nowhere and you can't predict it. It's not, it's not linear, like, okay, I'm grieving really. Like intensely today it's a ten, tomorrow it's going to be a nine, the next day it's going to be an eight.
00:31:29:07 - 00:31:54:20
Kelly Deutsch
Then it'll eventually dwindle into nothing. You know, it's just such a wild roller coaster that you just can't predict. and I'm also thinking too, of my own experience, with, with chronic illness, when it's like, I'm doing great, you know, and I might have a great week. I might have a great month. And then out of nowhere, I'm just like slammed and, you know, and I'm in bed for days at a time and you just you can't know that.
00:31:54:20 - 00:32:16:16
Kelly Deutsch
And everybody is trying to like, you know, figure out like, okay, well what could it be? What's the trigger? How do you figure? You know, and like sometimes I it's not a clear answer. Yeah. There is not a great way for like why is there suffering in the world? Why does pain exist. Why does evil like, I don't know how to answer that, but right now I got to go lay down, and I don't have energy to entertain your.
00:32:16:16 - 00:32:19:15
Speaker 3
Questions right now, you know? Totally.
00:32:19:17 - 00:32:44:11
Amy Kenny
And the more that we try to fit it into our calendars and clocks, I think the more that we pretend we can control it. And actually we can't. And there's such wisdom of disabled embodiment that proclaims, I am not my productivity, I have worth regardless of my productivity. And I'm going to go lay down regardless of whether you understand why.
00:32:44:13 - 00:32:49:20
Amy Kenny
And if you know, if all of us could do that, would a different well do we would have.
00:32:49:23 - 00:33:10:02
Kelly Deutsch
Absolutely. I know for me that was such a great gift of that time of severe illness. You know, when I was bedridden and I remember I was just so weak I couldn't even smile, which was so weird because, you know, everybody was like, Kelly, the joyful servant, you know, was going to go love the world. And to have all of that, like, ripped away from me.
00:33:10:04 - 00:33:27:13
Kelly Deutsch
It was just like, who am I now? Like, what does this mean about my life and what I meant to do? Like, what if I'm. What if I become a vegetable? Like then what? What does that mean about who I am? And, you know, it's like. I mean, obviously, yes, God still loves me, but does my what? Does my life still have purpose?
00:33:27:13 - 00:33:48:15
Kelly Deutsch
Like it? Oh, man. I have to grapple with all of those questions that a lot of people, I think honestly don't grapple with, either at all, or until they're older, when they're struggling with disability for the first time, when, oh my gosh, my body's not working like it used to, and I can't take care of myself independently like I used to do or take care of everyone else.
00:33:48:15 - 00:34:12:12
Kelly Deutsch
And so it's, it is, I think the silver lining in that, if you will, is that gift of really grappling with that existential uncertainty that we all live in, but not all of us. face on a day to day basis because we can cushion ourselves with, you know, comforts and money and privilege and whatever it is.
00:34:12:14 - 00:34:22:08
Amy Kenny
Yeah, non-disabled people can pretend for a lot longer that they are independent and they're not, but they can pretend for a lot longer, even even fooling themselves. I think.
00:34:24:01 - 00:34:47:06
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. Yeah. I'm curious in your experience of the pandemic over the past you know year and a half or two. what. What kind of conversations have you had with people of all different kinds of bodies. You know, because I think my hunch is that a lot of us have faced our existential uncertainty for perhaps the first time.
00:34:47:09 - 00:34:51:13
Kelly Deutsch
Have you been having any conversations about things like that?
00:34:51:16 - 00:35:16:27
Amy Kenny
No, none. Yeah, yeah, all over the place. I think that the pandemic has been tricky in a lot of ways for disabled people, because suddenly everyone is given the accommodations that we've been asking for for quite some time. You know, we've been asking for telecommuting or zoom conferences or, you know, flexible work schedules. And it turns out that was possible.
00:35:17:00 - 00:35:38:13
Amy Kenny
It's just that no one wanted to give it when it was disabled people asking for it. So I think that part has been frustrating, and that part has been frustrating to kind of watch people discover, some of the truths that we've known for quite some time and act as though this were brand new information, and we were all just discovering it together.
00:35:38:15 - 00:36:07:25
Amy Kenny
One of my pet peeves is definitely becoming people saying, oh, we just all no one could have known what this would be like. We no one could have predicted. And I think no disabled people predicted it. You're just not paying attention to us. I think. I think that's a real trend with not thinking about disabled old people as bearers of wisdom and embodied knowledge that can teach the rest of the world.
00:36:07:27 - 00:36:29:00
Amy Kenny
And I have noticed a lot in the pandemic, people just discovering concepts like uncertainty or, you know, that we actually can't control outcomes as we would like. And that's something that chronically ill and disabled folks have known for a long time.
00:36:29:03 - 00:37:00:16
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. That's, that idea that none of us are promised tomorrow. It's, I honestly think that's why the gospel for why Jesus holds up all the marginalized so frequently, especially the poor, because they live on the edge of that existential uncertainty all the time, you know? And that's really that interior position of receptivity, of just saying, like, I can't you can.
00:37:00:18 - 00:37:02:21
Speaker 3
Hear you have to because I can't.
00:37:02:21 - 00:37:20:28
Kelly Deutsch
You know, before the divine and having that, both the trust and that receptivity to saying, like, I, I can't depend on tomorrow, I don't know necessarily where the ground is and having that that spiritual poverty, if you will.
00:37:21:00 - 00:37:52:22
Amy Kenny
Yeah. And all your plans are in pencil when your body fluctuates frequently. So this idea that we can plan what we're doing next week, you know, all of my plans are dependent on spoons and dependent on, you know, whether I'm able to do it. And people in my life have learned well to be flexible to that. And I think if only we would then turn that inward and we would be flexible with ourselves and realize, actually, some days you just can't.
00:37:52:24 - 00:38:06:29
Amy Kenny
And that means just giving it up and realizing this doesn't make me less than it doesn't make me less valuable or loved or cherished. but it just means that today I'm not doing this thing, even if I really want to.
00:38:07:01 - 00:38:32:24
Kelly Deutsch
Right? Yeah. Like the world is not going to fall apart if you don't. Whatever. Fill in the blank. Get this errand done, finish this thing at work. Call that person. You know what? And I think, again, going back to that analogy of grief, that's like a great example of that. Like if if your loved one, some immediate family member died and that phone call didn't get made, like, is this really going to change everything?
00:38:33:23 - 00:38:49:16
Kelly Deutsch
sometimes you just have to take perspective. But it's harder to extend that that grace, that flexibility to ourselves, than it is to, you know, other people who are grieving or struggling or, you know, whatever it is. Yeah. Or even just run out of time in a day.
00:38:49:19 - 00:38:50:00
Speaker 3
You know?
00:38:50:02 - 00:38:55:29
Amy Kenny
Yeah, totally. We just have too much to do. And if only we could be as kind to ourselves as we are to our friends.
00:38:57:19 - 00:39:18:13
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. I remember when I was leaving Italy, one of the sisters in this community that I was with, if there was a mystic in the community, it was her. I remember as I was leaving, she turned to me and told me in Italian, she was like, cuando tawny divey a very outgoing small poodle, which means, like when you return, you have to have pure selfishness.
00:39:18:17 - 00:39:20:13
Speaker 3
And I was like.
00:39:20:15 - 00:39:22:15
Kelly Deutsch
That is weird advice from a mystic.
00:39:22:15 - 00:39:24:01
Speaker 3
But okay, you know.
00:39:24:03 - 00:39:38:24
Kelly Deutsch
But I as I got home, I was like, oh my gosh, she was so right. Like, I need to say no to everything. Stop pushing myself. Stop. Like if there's even the least doubt in my mind, say like, you know what? Not today. Sorry.
00:39:38:26 - 00:40:07:27
Amy Kenny
Yeah. And that's an interesting way that I think ableism has actually become internalized, even for non-disabled people. That kind of notion that our worth is rooted in what we do and not who we are, in what we produce and what we control, rather than in loving one another and just having worth simply because we are made in the image of a creator God.
00:40:08:00 - 00:40:14:17
Kelly Deutsch
That gives me the chills to think that essentially most of our perfectionism is, is ableism.
00:40:14:20 - 00:40:39:00
Amy Kenny
Absolutely, yeah. And thinking that you can be perfect or that you can do it all and what even is perfect and who gets to decide? And that that just seems really eugenicist, you know, and very much rooted in ableism that that is this idea of one perfect body and one perfect form. How could that be? Look at the beautiful diversity of all of creation.
00:40:39:00 - 00:40:45:01
Amy Kenny
Why would we want to reduce that to this Barbie doll theology, where we all have to look the same.
00:40:45:03 - 00:40:45:26
Kelly Deutsch
Boring and.
00:40:46:02 - 00:40:48:02
Amy Kenny
Gross?
00:40:48:04 - 00:41:06:24
Kelly Deutsch
Preach it down with the Barbie doll theology. Oh, I love that. while we still have some time, I wanted to return to the book for a minute, and I was curious. is. Well, first of all, is this your first book, or have you written others?
00:41:06:27 - 00:41:24:28
Amy Kenny
Yeah, I have written before for work kind of academically. Okay. This is definitely my first book. Writing about my experience being disabled is definitely my first book that anyone will read. Sure, sure. My books are really just they go in a library shelf and that's really all they do.
00:41:25:01 - 00:41:41:19
Kelly Deutsch
Sure, sure. Not necessarily meant for the public consumption in the same way. Yeah. So I'm curious what your process for writing was like. Like, are you the kind of disciplined person where you like, wake up early and write for two hours or more, like, oh, I followed the inspiration of the muses.
00:41:41:22 - 00:42:01:13
Amy Kenny
I am probably a mix of those depending on the day in the weather. Okay, so I have a wonderful writing group with through a Freedom Road and they meet on Saturday mornings, and so that would definitely be the disciplined part of myself. It starts at 6 a.m. my time, and so I would be there every Saturday at 6 a.m..
00:42:01:15 - 00:42:27:20
Amy Kenny
But the kind of more other end of the spectrum that you described aspect of myself is that there's you can't force yourself to create words or to create when you're not kind of in the zone. And so sometimes writing for me is looking at the trees or watching the squirrels frolic outside or petting my dog or listening to a podcast.
00:42:27:20 - 00:42:36:02
Amy Kenny
That's all part of it. And I have to believe that it's all kind of working itself out in the words and in the message that I'm kind of bringing.
00:42:37:22 - 00:42:58:02
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah I love the, the process of that and that, that's an important part of it. I mean yeah, even when I was working in corporate and I did like a lot of leadership development and you know trained people on like emotional intelligence and I used to joke with people that I trained people how to how not to be assholes.
00:42:58:05 - 00:42:59:00
Speaker 3
And.
00:42:59:18 - 00:43:27:07
Kelly Deutsch
but I did have to do a lot of, you know, content and course development and, I, I would have no problem taking, like, an extra long break, taking a walk because I'm like, I this is part of my process. Even if I'm not, like, sitting or standing at my desk, like the whole the walking, the looking at the squirrels scurrying, the whatever it is that that's such an important part of the the soaking.
00:43:27:07 - 00:43:33:15
Kelly Deutsch
And, I don't know, even though it doesn't look productive from the outside.
00:43:33:18 - 00:43:52:10
Amy Kenny
And what a great way to through an embodied practice, dismantle evil Islam. because in order to trust the process, in order to take Sabbath in order to rest, you're really denouncing that you have to keep producing on that kind of hamster wheel.
00:43:53:18 - 00:44:13:09
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, absolutely. I remember even just using an example from, from the corporate world. One of the companies that I worked with was in manufacturing. And so I'd been training, you know, some leaders and managers there and talking about the difference of, of two employees. And we talk about this one guy who's been there for, you know, like 30 years working out in the plant.
00:44:13:11 - 00:44:29:24
Kelly Deutsch
And they called him, like, poetry in motion. You know, it was just very fluid. He was unhurried, but just like got his work done versus somebody else, you know, let's call this other guy Brad, you know, who's like, hustling about and like, Brad is doing all of his things and running to and fro. And you always saw Brad like running all over the place.
00:44:29:24 - 00:45:07:17
Kelly Deutsch
So everybody thought Brad was way more productive than, let's call Joe poetry in motion. You know, who's just very like, fluid, kind of calm doing his thing. But they found that like Joe out produced Brad the hungrier by twice just by being calm and being present and kind of doing his thing. And I, I think of that in our daily life when we take time for, you know, contemplative prayer or your spiritual practice or to just breathe and be present or reminds me of, Mother Teresa, you know, in Calcutta and, sometimes when her sisters would be like, oh my gosh, we have so much to do.
00:45:07:18 - 00:45:15:25
Kelly Deutsch
How are we ever going to get this? How do we have time for an hour of silent prayer? And she's like, oh, you're right. We're so busy. We need to pray two hours today.
00:45:15:27 - 00:45:19:24
Speaker 3
Like, I think that's wonderful, because.
00:45:19:26 - 00:45:45:00
Kelly Deutsch
That is a great way of kind of deconstructing and dismantling that, that ableism as if productivity has to look like us. I think honestly has more to do with that interior feeling of that, like sympathetic, you know, busyness internally versus like, we think we're not getting things done or being a good human being if we're calm somehow.
00:45:45:02 - 00:45:49:23
Amy Kenny
Yeah, we think we can manufacture our own worthiness.
00:45:51:00 - 00:46:11:13
Amy Kenny
And we can do that through busyness and that just that doesn't make sense on a corporate level. It doesn't make sense on a spiritual level. Does it make sense on a physical level because you just get burnt out? And I think about Jesus and this idea of Jesus being the three mile an hour God that John Swinton talks about, and you know, Jesus isn't in a hurry.
00:46:11:19 - 00:46:33:05
Amy Kenny
Jesus is slow and moves at a slow pace and is fine, kind of wandering and withering and that's probably, you know, something to model our own spiritual practices on, rather than just taking the words of Jesus and trying to kind of enforce those on others through these prayers.
00:46:34:16 - 00:47:00:22
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. Looking more at his life, his rhythm rather than like, kind of a more intellectual process. Totally. Yeah, yeah. as you're writing your book, was there a particular theme or passage that still really sticks with you today?
00:47:00:25 - 00:47:01:28
Amy Kenny
Of my own book.
00:47:06:12 - 00:47:39:26
Amy Kenny
I mean, all of it is kind of a piece of my soul that I am offering up to the world and asking for the world to be tender with. it's a very vulnerable process writing. And I think in it I talk a lot about the ableism I've experienced at churches and at schools and through various contexts, and how that has affected me internally, because I think a lot of times I'm sort of putting on a poker face of brushing it off or saying, oh, that's not cool, but just kind of moving on.
00:47:40:03 - 00:48:20:10
Amy Kenny
And internally I'm, you know, crying or feeling like I'm beaten down. Essentially. I think, one passage that I am still kind of sitting with, maybe is the idea that. Disabled people are just inherently creative and innovative and thinking about how, because the world isn't made for us, we have had to be creative and kind of design our own solutions.
00:48:20:10 - 00:48:56:18
Amy Kenny
So everything from a touch screen to texting to a potato peeler is designed by and for and with disabled people. And I think about the idea that, you know, disability is defined in a number of different ways. And I think one way that I like to define it is that kind of creative force that is just innately innovative and comes up with different ways of experiencing and being in the world that the norm has just never had to.
00:48:58:16 - 00:49:01:06
Kelly Deutsch
I like that.
00:49:03:18 - 00:49:07:00
Kelly Deutsch
And what a wonderful thing to have, like a positively framed.
00:49:07:03 - 00:49:07:24
Speaker 3
Definition.
00:49:07:24 - 00:49:28:23
Kelly Deutsch
Of disability and sort of just like my body doesn't work like everybody else is like, no, like I it's I mean, there there's some level of sure. But to be able to I mean, I feel like that's one of the underlying themes of this whole conversation is it's not just like you're normal. I'm not just like, yeah, our bodies all work differently.
00:49:28:23 - 00:49:31:18
Kelly Deutsch
And can we please make space for them all?
00:49:31:21 - 00:49:56:19
Amy Kenny
Yeah, exactly. And it's so interesting. Whenever I talk about my body, there's always someone else who raises their hand and not not someone else who's disabled or wouldn't consider themselves as that. But, you know, through an experience with chronic illness, through an experience with pregnancy, with grief, with corporate culture, productivity, with all different kinds of things, learning from the embodied wisdom of disabled bodies.
00:49:56:21 - 00:50:19:21
Amy Kenny
And that's just not something that we're taught, I think. I don't think we are taught to think about disability through a disability gains model. What can it teach us and how does it add to our lives? I think we're taught through that kind of lost model of my legs don't work in a way that is considered normative, and so therefore I'm less than.
00:50:19:24 - 00:50:52:07
Amy Kenny
But actually I roll, I glide, I, you know, get to feel the symphony of the pavement beneath my body in ways that people who are walking don't. They're it's like clunky walking, you know. So I think even just reframing what disabled bodies are and what we bring to the to the world with spirituality, with our own lived experience, I think is such, something that not many people have done yet.
00:50:53:20 - 00:51:14:09
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah. And I love, I love that you're doing that especially with this book. It's wonderful to be able to say something. So deeply tender yet true and, and vulnerable and to be able to share that with the world. That is such a gift. And I think that's what the best writing really does.
00:51:14:12 - 00:51:43:06
Amy Kenny
Yeah, I hope so. Yeah, I hope, I hope it invites people to think and to rethink what they've been taught and to move not just from pity into compassion, but also to really think about we shouldn't just be tolerated, we should be celebrated. you know, all of us, whatever our bodies look like or feel like or can do or can't do, or however our minds function, all of it.
00:51:43:13 - 00:51:47:20
Amy Kenny
There's room for all of us to be celebrated in the gifts that each of us bring.
00:51:47:22 - 00:52:08:06
Kelly Deutsch
Yeah, I love that. That's a wonderful, kind of closing thought of moving from from toleration to celebration for all of us. Yeah, wonderful. If people want to learn more about what you're up to or, you know, preorder your book, where should they go?
00:52:08:08 - 00:52:26:18
Amy Kenny
For my book, my buddy is that our prayer request is on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. You can also find me on my website. Amy. Income. And sometimes on Instagram now too. I'm I'm still figuring it out, I'll admit. So it's at Doctor Amy Kenny on Instagram.
00:52:26:21 - 00:52:33:23
Kelly Deutsch
Wonderful. Is there anything that you would like to leave with our audience? And in conclusion, today.
00:52:33:26 - 00:52:52:09
Amy Kenny
I would just like to say that you, to all of you, have eternal and divine worth, that your body and your productivity don't take from that. And the world just hasn't gotten used to seeing your shine yet.
00:52:53:25 - 00:53:04:10
Kelly Deutsch
beautiful. Amy, thank you so much for joining us today. This has been a delightful conversation, and thank you everyone who tuned in and listened to us as well for joining us.