Voices on the Side

Yejin is the cutest comrade you could ask for in the movement for collective liberation. Through her clarity, honesty, and TikTok dances, she makes anti-oppression work look simply irresistible. They are also an equity and justice coach, consultant, and practitioner in service of community care. This is such a joyful conversation, which is a testament to Yejin’s expert ability to guide connections...

Cami is an author, artist, and embodiment practitioner dedicated to creating networks of care and livable futures. Their book  Tending Grief  is an embodied guide to being with grief individually and in community through practical exercises, decolonized rituals, and Earth-based medicines for healing.   Our conversation is a compass for how to move forward in radical honesty and hope as we find our...

Judy is a certified hypnotherapist, mindfulness and meditation practitioner, somatic activated healer, and psych researcher. Our conversation touched upon so many experiences and thoughts, frequently through the lens of our shared Korean roots. I want to offer a trigger warning for this episode as we talk about mental illness including suicidal ideation and childhood abuse. Although we talk about...

Joon is a hospital chaplain, author, but perhaps most importantly — a father. A fellow Korean American, we share and understand a lot of each other’s experiences growing up with immigrant parents, in the ever liminal third space between cultures and identities. We talk about the contradictions of our culture, with a history of aligning with the oppressed amidst the continued toxic elements of coll...

Rev. Mo is an interfaith minister, meditation teacher, and trained clairvoyant. Mo also intentionally goes by another name, Hilal, the story of which he shares in the episode.  Mo is Palestinian Bahraini, and we talk about his experience navigating his layered identity, from his grandparents having been displaced in 1948 to continually being in a constant state of immigration and exile.  This is a...

Voices on the Side with Leah Kim is a podcast centering marginalized identities as an antidote to oppression and supremacy. We invite a variety of guests to be in conversation together, from revolutionary thinkers, writers, and artists to folks and friends sharing stories rooted in their personal history.  We share our hope in imagining a freer and safer future for all — an existence that is roote...

Tiffany is an artist whose work is centered on liberation. Through her painting, writing, and music, she leads with so much love for humanity. She reminds us that hope is a discipline, no different to the discipline and practice that goes into any creative process. We talk about what it means to truly be in community, and how challenging this can be while we are beholden to existing in oppressive...

Paris is a mother, yoga teacher, and doctor. Born in Russia of Iranian descent, Paris has Muslim and Jewish family while she herself is a practicing Hindu. Perhaps this is why she embodies tolerance through different identities and ideologies.  Amidst a resounding silence throughout the yoga and wellness world, Paris has been a steady and unapologetic voice for humanity. In our conversation, we ta...

Joon Ae is a Korean adoptee, mother, and writer. Estranged from her adoptive family, community means everything to her. She cultivates intersectional and justice-centered spaces such as  Constellation  and  Voices  and recently held an auction for the Abu Dayer family to escape genocide. If you enjoy and learn anything from this episode, please consider  donating  — even $1 helps. Joon Ae and I ta...

Yuval is an Israeli, anti-zionist Jew, an artist, a writer, a dancer but most importantly — a human. He hosts the  Emergent Wisdom podcast , which explores current events and the challenges of being human through the lens of ecology and mysticism. He is dedicated to the liberation of love, land, and Eros — which we talk about in this episode. Hearing Yuval speak is at once grounding and uplifting....

Liz is the president of AAP(I belong), a nonprofit organization that aims to raise greater awareness on Asian American Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander discrimination and cultural challenges. Liz created AAP(I belong) after her mother was attacked — for being Asian. We talk about the way that the Asian American identity is structured to be successful and how we are gaslit to think that we are...

I am very excited to welcome Michelle back on the podcast. In this conversation, we talk about making room for multiple feelings, self-erasure, and pressure testing our values.  Since her last visit, Michelle went back to our shared motherland of Korea. I loved hearing about how it felt like it was her first time returning home. We also address the institution-wide repression when it comes to libe...

Amanda is a Jewish, queer, anti-zionist writer and poet. Her words have been clarifying, educational, and ultimately — liberating. Witnessing the genocide in Gaza, where the population is over 1 million children, I personally have unearthed a courage that I haven’t ever felt as a woman of color in this country. It’s felt scary at times, especially as people I had considered friends yelled at me an...

Mo is a Palestinian artist, author, digital creator, and father. He has been tireless in educating all of us on what is and has been happening in Palestine for 76+ years.  Mo shares with us how it was to visit Palestine for the first time last September, from standing outside his grandfather’s ancestral home to the guilt he felt that he was able to set foot on his homeland when most of his extende...

Jemarc is a trauma recovery coach and wellness consultant supporting Queer, BIPOC, and neurodivergent beings. They are a speaker and lead workshops including the upcoming master class — Reclaiming Your Compassion — on May 18. (Details pinned on their profile.) In our conversation, Jemarc shares their personal story of identity, trauma, and healing. They emphasize the absolutely powerful force of u...

We are back with one of our most beloved guests, Sasha. Sasha is an ancestral healing practitioner and death doula who has been a truly incredible voice of collective liberation and dismantling supremacy culture and thinking. Since her last visit to the podcast, Sasha has launched  Phoenix Rising  — a community for healers of the resistance.  This conversation is fuel for the soul. We talk about w...

Tejal is an Indian American yoga teacher, writer, podcaster, and community organizer. She advocates for yoga through a social justice lens through her  online studio , the  abcdyogi  global community, and the  Yoga is Dead podcast . We talk about our respective journeys to becoming yoga teachers and the issues we see in the yoga and wellness world. From spiritual bypassing to centering physical mo...

Judy is a Boundary Coach, speaker, and author of The Boundary Revolution. With two decades of clinical experience as a Licensed Mental Health Counselor, Judy expertly journeys with individuals and groups towards boundary healing and collective liberation. In our conversation, we share our personal stories around growing up in an immigrant family, parenting our children, and being committed to brea...

Sole is a social justice educator, writer, speaker, and the founder of Nectar, which provides political education and healing justice to support communities and movements. She is currently an Activist-in-Residence at the UCLA Asian American Studies Center. Starting with her own immigration story, Sole teaches us about the rules of whiteness, the fact that white supremacy is not about the actual co...

Hasanain is a father, social justice educator, and longtime activist and organizer. I personally have been learning so much from him about the way oppressive systems are impacting all of us regardless of our privileges, where we live, or how we identify. In this conversation, we talk about whiteness as a construct, the role of propaganda, and why representation is not enough. Hasanain’s ability to...

Susanna is a yoga educator, yoga unity activist, founder of the Ignite Institute and co-founder of the Yoke Yoga Social App . She is the author of Embrace Yoga’s Roots , and offers a free chapter of her book linked here . As an Indian teacher in the West, Susanna is known for her work in decolonizing and embracing the roots of yoga. She reminds us — with much compassion and often levity — that yog...

Nadia is a Palestinian from the American south. She is a chef and filmmaker and has been an incredibly beautiful and important voice in the name of community healing. I loved hearing about the pride she has always had in her Palestinian heritage and cuisine and her yearly visits back home which served as a sort of detox from Americanism.  With both of us being yogis, we talk about the difference b...

Rohan is a queer/non-binary Black Asian writer, dancer, trumpeter and community organizer in New York City. They founded the  Blasian March , a Black-Asian-Blasian grassroots solidarity organization, which has been featured on major networks including CNN, NBC Chicago, USA Today, and WNYC. We talk about racial assumptions and identity — I especially loved learning about their gender identity being...

Zach is a Jewish historian of Palestine who received his Ph. D in Near Eastern Studies from Princeton University. He grew up in a very Jewish and Zionist environment — he was in Jewish youth groups, went to Jewish summer camp, and studied abroad in Jerusalem. Jews are 0.2% of the global population and anti-Zionist Jews an even smaller percentage, so Zach’s perspective and expertise are both unique...

Juliette is a Korean American neuroscientist, adjunct professor, writer, and CFO/COO of a biotech company called Cambrian. On her socials, she offers uplifting advice and insights related to a variety of topics including communication, health, emotions, and networking. As a woman of color in spaces where representation is typically imbalanced, Juliette encourages us all to tap into our worth and o...