To be clear…
Last week I posted an article “Being a True Transformational Leader means doing your own Anti-Racism work” you can read it HERE.
I want to share the message again, and take it a step further in the hopes that it will be helpful:
If you are white, and want to be in-integrity calling yourself a transformational leader, coach, teacher or guide, it is important to:
1. Look at the biases & racist ideas that live deep inside of you.
Even if you believe all people are & should be equal, you have been brought up within our culture’s systemic racism, and therefore you carry some unconscious racist ideas inside of you.
Yes, this is painful & possibly shameful to acknowledge.
The first time I really acknowledged the systemic racism inside of me was in 2016, and because I think of myself as “a good person”, it was absolutely excruciatingly painful.
But it must be done.
If you avoid your shame & don’t look at your biases head-on, you will continue to sleepwalk without seeing them….and inadvertently cause harm to black people and people of color.
2. Continue to acknowledge the impact of your privilege & root out the internalized racism inside of you. It’s not a once and done.
Looking at your deeper biases and how you take your privileges is not something that can be done only once. If done only once, the learning and the corrections don’t stick. True learning and transformation happen when you commit consistently and persistently. The moment you think you’re done is the moment you become complacent. I know that my own anti-racism journey will never be done.
As Andrea Ranae (@andrearanaej) says: “Anti-racism is not an identity or a checklist; it’s a practice.” READ MORE