We recently connected with Soma Snakeoil and have shared our conversation below.
Soma, first a big thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and insights with us today. I’m sure many of our readers will benefit from your wisdom, and one of the areas where we think your insight might be most helpful is related to imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is holding so many people back from reaching their true and highest potential and so we’d love to hear about your journey and how you overcame imposter syndrome.
I can not claim to have overcome imposter syndrome. It’s an insidious experience that creeps up on me, especially when the stakes are high or I feel like I really need to deliver. I can claim to have learned to live with imposter syndrome. When I feel it coming on I speak to myself in a similar way to how I would speak to my child. I say, “You got this. Stand your ground. Say all the words out loud that you want to keep in your head.” The internal dialogue helps support me through self-doubt, but sometimes I need more. I stand in front of a mirror, with my hands on my hips (like Wonder Woman or a Professional Dominatrix) and I time myself for 2 minutes in that power stance. I read about this somewhere as a life hack that helps in high-pressure situations. There’s something about higher testosterone and lower cortisol that makes this technique effective. I especially take this time to boost myself up before public speaking or having to navigate a particularly hard task. Meditation is also a major part of managing my difficult thoughts and feelings. I also look to women I admire, sometimes for guidance and sometimes as a role model. I do not think imposter syndrome goes away. Rather, like many painful experiences, I think we get better at recognizing and managing our response to it.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I am the co-founder and executive director of The Sidewalk Project, a lived experience harm reduction organization based in Los Angeles, primarily functioning in Skid Row, MacArthur Park, Merced, and Phoenix, Arizona. I spend almost every waking hour working on projects for my organization! My passion for this work comes from my lived experience with houselessness, drug use, sex work, being a single mom, and surviving intimate partner violence, sexual assault, and DCFS encounters. My survival of common social issues provides me with expertise and empathy for my work.
Outside of The Sidewalk Project, I am a mother of an adult nonbinary kid, am a meditation facilitator, a professional Dominatrix, and a multi-disciplinary artist. My art and activism intersect with every aspect of my life, and I try to stay as radically honest as possible to avoid stigma and shame. As a result, I am not accepted by many of my family members. I have a chosen family that fills that role for me.
This next year sees a growth spurt for my organization as we have received new opportunities to grow our community-centered work, including a crisis response/overdose response team for MacArthur Park, a violence interruption team for Skid Row, and a newly funded HIV program for street-based sex workers, Trans sex workers of color and men who have sex with men. I could not be prouder of my team and the life-saving work they do every day in the streets of LA.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
I have learned how to be okay with other people’s people body fluids, infections, or poop from a young age. That might sound gross, or questionable as a skill, but let me explain. At age 16, I became a CNA for long-term care. I learned how to change diapers, bedpans, colostomy bags, and give enemas. As a single mom, you know, moms clean up every kind of body fluid and likely lice and other creepy crawlies. As a Dominatrix, here we go again with body fluids, and I have for sure cleaned poop off of dildos and hardwood floors. Now, I spend a good portion of my life working in the streets, elbow-deep in snot, infected wounds, and poop. I’m being flippant about it, but I truly believe cleaning up poop has made me a better, more empathetic person.
I studied meditation in the Buddhist Thai Forest tradition in a highly structured environment. I switched my meditation practice and my teacher about three years ago and studied under a former monk who practiced in Shri Lanka. He went on to pioneer a style of practice that, in my mind, is closer to the practice’s origins, rooted in the Satti Pattana Sutta. The style of practice is called Recollective Awareness and encourages the practitioner to embrace their whole experience, including their thoughts and feelings.
I studied in a traditional BDSM fashion under the unimitable Domina Angelina of San Diego, Dungeon Servitus. Under her guidance, I deeply learned, as both a Top and a bottom, about ethical practices in BDSM, tricks of the trade, blood-borne pathogens, how to play in a risk-aware consensual way, and picked up a plethora of skills from flogging to putting a metal rod down the head of a cock. My training under Domina Angelina has continued in one way or another for about 17 years. She is my beloved Mentor, and I am her Protege.
What was the most impactful thing your parents did for you?
My parents were “God Smugglers”. The easiest way to describe what they did was creating Christian propaganda in film and print, translating that content into different languages, and smuggling that content into places like the East Bloc during the Cold War. Though I do not agree with their religious lifestyle or proselytizing, I learned from them how to be willing to take great risks to create the change in the world that you envision. I also learned from them the importance of giving a voice to marginalized people to empower communities. They used to say intense things like, “If you want to live for Jesus, you need to be willing to die for Jesus.” Again, though I don’t agree with that zealotry their influence has allowed me to be proud and vocal as I fight for things I am passionate about. One thing my mother said that I will always value was: Everything you do, be passionate about it.
Contact Info:
- Website: TheSidewalkProject.org
- Instagram: @SomaSnakeoil
- Twitter: @GoddessSoma
- Youtube: https://youtu.be/53OSrLFhMZA?feature=shared
Image Credits
Image owned by Soma Snakeoil in collaboration with Venomous Pinks Photo one: With Domina Angelina, photographed by Surgeon Studios Photo two: Photoshoot owned by The Venomous Pinks Photo 3 and 4: By Adam Trunell on Sidewalk Project outreach
