Equity is a practice. It is a practice of the personal and structural work of truth and transformation. This is what I help leaders and communities understand and embody as they unlearn various forms of inequity like racism, sexism, and queerantagonism. I introduce them to a 12-step process for unlearning addiction to the misuse of power. In order to do so from a place of authenticity, I had to begin my own journey unlearning habits of sexism that I didn’t even know were in me. Here’s a bit of my story, taken from UnLearn InEquity our new experiential course.
I get it. Cultivating a power analysis and admitting how you yourself have misused power–steps 4 and 5–are hard. They can be filled with a lot of guilt and shame. They are definitely filled with discomfort and struggle.
I was a tenderhearted kid in a world that did not treat tender hearts well. It didn’t help that I had a big mouth and big voice and didn’t understand the difference between the two. I didn’t know that I was saying the normally unspoken parts out loud and, at the same time, that people listened. Few bothered to explain. Maybe they didn’t know how. They just reacted hard.
Looking back, I don’t blame them. But the impact was what the impact was. Both for them and for me. It hurt so bad, worse than I knew how to put into words. I became convinced at an early age that I couldn’t live a life filled with that type of pain. I started to self-protect, so it wouldn’t hurt as much. I toughened up, as they say. On one hand, that wasn’t seen as a bad thing. On the other hand, it came at a cost. I walled off my full range of feelings so that rejection, when it came, wouldn’t hurt so much.
I remember exactly how it happened and approximately when. At about 7 or 8 years old, I leaned into my head over my heart. It was a simple enough choice. I hate emotional pain. I don’t mind losing a physical altercation. I don’t mind losing an argument. But emotional pain and/or emotional messiness, I despise them.
Plus, I was a smart little kid. I was so smart that my questions would piss insecure adults off. I somehow knew that, come what may, you couldn’t take my intelligence from me. I could win with smart. If I got blocked at something, I’d figure out the work around. Relying on my head was the work around.
Those are perfectly good reasons for remaining emotionally inaccessible. Every power abuser has their own version of them. However, those reasons have nothing to do with who I want to be in the world.
I’m so grateful I have a therapist who invited me to go back and reacquaint myself with that little tenderhearted kid stuck at seven and to start growing him up. I am deeply grateful for friends who make up my circles of accountability, who see me for more than my shortcomings, but who also acknowledge my shortcomings and are committed to loving me past them. And I am intensely grateful for a family with whom I can begin again when I make mistakes.
In the work of truth and transformation, yes, you learn to make room for other people, but in doing so, you also learn to make room for your full, true self. Our social addictions harm others. They also harm us. We need not be ashamed of that harm. We need to heal from it. Healing starts when we can stare deeply, truthfully at our own reflection and say, “‘You are welcome here; all of you is welcome here.’ Now let’s grow.” READ ABOUT THE THIRD LEG OF MY JOURNEY>>>
If you or your organization could use design, advisory, facilitation, or strategy support continuing your own equity journey–including subscriptions to our new UnLearn InEquity self-paced course–contact us.
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