October Featured Author | Alyssa Pizarro
Welcome to our featured author series where we share different points of view on advancing social justice and DEI+B efforts through the ever evolving fields of multicultural organizational development, human resources, implementation science, equitable evaluation and applied research, improvement science, learning science, performance measurement, and team science.
Each month we highlight someone in this work we admire and have learned from in the past. Our hope is that you find new perspectives, ideas, and insights to inspire and challenge the way you live and work.
Alyssa Pizarro
Sr. Mgr Equity + Inclusion Evaluator, Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP)
Alyssa Pizarro is the Senior Manager of Equity and Inclusion at the Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP). She enjoys leading and learning with the amazing people at MoPOP who share their knowledge of pop culture along with their skills and talent with the community everyday.
After leaving a 10-year fashion career in New York and moving to Seattle, she returned to her social justice roots by leading with her passion for yoga and service in the nonprofit world. Alyssa is a 200-hr yoga certified instructor and continues to focus on empowerment using these tools in her nonprofit career. She has worked in Development and Facilitation, but found her calling in DEIA work where she infuses her experience and knowledge of mindfulness in all that she does.
Alyssa has lived in Seattle for 10 years with her partner and her sweet rescue pitbull, Carlie.
Why do you do the work you do?
It is through my passion for healing work that I was able to recognize the unspoken, but vital, dance between healing and DEIA. I feel I am called to not simply offer and integrate prevalent DEIA processes in my work, but also to offer tools to heal the harm in the name of my ancestors (really, our ancestors), past and future.
I love dreaming of, and building, a safe world for all, so honestly, I love this work! I love the hope that is demanded of me/us every day in DEIA. It is hard, real, and beautiful.
I also recognize what a privilege it is to potentially be a small part of the change and the healing that happens through DEIA work. For me, this is not a profession, it is lifework that I not only live and breathe, but speak and practice. And (as if there could be more) I get to do this DEIA work at the phenomenal Museum of Pop Culture!
What technique, method, tool, theory or practice would you like to highlight that is promising and/or proven for advancing social justice?
I am learning about restorative justice in workplaces, and feel this tool is incredibly promising.
Yes, restorative justice was conceived for working in the US carceral system and is being used by some across the country in that field, but there is a shared belief that it can be beneficial in other spaces. Rather than expecting perfect behavior and punishing people when harm happens, restorative justice cultivates and normalizes healing and connection post-harm for all the parties involved because harm will inevitably happen.
I am far from an expert who uses restorative justice and am very much still learning, but I appreciate that it is non-punitive and is a method for connecting rather than excluding; it invites “leaning in” rather than “turning away.” Restorative justice asks how we can acknowledge that people make mistakes and offers ways for them to heal by inviting healing to happen in the damaged relationships their harm caused. In my view, restorative justice can truly make DEIA a catalyst for changing organizational culture by being a method to co-create workspaces that center relationships allowing for individual and organizational growth along with authentic community engagement and impact.
I cannot wait to explore this more deeply, and welcome other’s thoughts and experiences with it. Please feel free to reach out to me directly! I am researching and am eager to learn (community@mopop.org - Please put my name in the subject line)!
What is one book you wish everyone would read?
One book is so difficult (because there are truly so many) but My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakam genuinely shifted my perspective on DEIA work. Reemaa’s book centers on healing the experiences of our individual past AND our ancestors' past that live in our bodies. It is informed by, not only his life experience, but also his work as a psychotherapist.
This book helped me to find a fresh and nuanced understanding of the dynamics at play between people in the United States around race. My Grandmother’s Hands offered me a perspective shift that gives permission for healing in community not despite differences, but while embracing differences.
Also, a majorly essential element of My Grandmother’s Hands is it incorporates mindfulness tools throughout so that while we read and learn, we prioritize our healing. It does not leave our bodies behind, which is often asked of us in the thinking/ cerebral spaces our work occupies. I just love this book so much that I cannot recommend it enough.
What are a couple of practices, resources, and/or tools that help you live more to your values on a daily?
Mindfulness! While this practice shifts with me to “look” different from day to day and year to year, mindful practice is at the heart of it. As you might have deduced from my book recommendation, mindfulness is deeply important to me; I can’t endorse it enough.
Right now, I mindfully jog, but sometimes I sit in meditation, sometimes I walk, sometimes I practice yoga asana, sometimes I do all the above. The point of my mindfulness practice is to bring myself to the present moment and bring awareness to my body. DEIA work is such a part of our heads and hearts, but I am constantly reminding myself that stories we hear and the work we do, also land on our bodies.
Resmaa Menakam speaks to mindfulness in detail in his book, but I believe that processing pain and heartbreak by mindfully moving is what keeps me resilient. I challenge myself to put myself first (it is not my go-to way of operating in this world), and as someone who has health challenges and has discovered self-worth, I now highly prioritize respecting the body which has allowed me to do the DEIA work that I love. To me, mindfulness is my love note to myself every day.
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