What I’ve learned This Past Week and How I’ll Continue My Education

3 important notes 1) there are no affiliate links in this post, 2) I refer to POC (People Of Color) and Black people. I know all Black people are POC, but not all POC are Black. I say POC though because this has been eye opening as to how I can be better to all POC. 3) each example only has 3 items. I only list 3 for the sake of length, but there are far more on my list for each item and I will regularly be sharing those through the Friday Favorites along with the other stuff I typically share on my IG (Instagram.)

This week has been incredibly eye opening. I’ve gone back and forth on sharing my thoughts and history because I know this isn’t about me and I know my voice should only be one of support. Not of my own narrative, but amplifying POC’s experiences. I was/am concerned about sounding self- righteous or white savior complex. This is not how I feel at all. I chose to share because it’s not about me. I have learned so much and feel it can be helpful to hear what others are learning, especially those who may have had similar feelings or experiences. If it can be helpful at all, I feel it’s worth sharing. I hope you can feel my intention through this.

Let me start out by saying, I have NEVER been racist if the definition you’re going off of is treating or thinking badly of a whole race. I have always whole heartedly loved everyone. However, the past few years and then like a fire hose this past week, I’ve learned how I and my family benefit from systemic racism, from a society built around and to benefit white people. I’ve learned how ignorant I was growing up and how much privilege I have as a White person. I am still learning about this and plan to never stop learning. One of my favorite and most true quotes I’ve heard is “White privilege does not mean your life hasn’t been hard, it means your skin color isn’t one of the things making it harder.” Unfortunately I couldn’t the author of the quote, but I love it. It is spot on. This doesn’t mean we don’t have to deal with sexism or any of the difficult things everyone goes through, etc, it just means my race isn’t one of them.

I grew up in an area severely lacking in diversity. There were other wonderful aspects, but diversity wasn’t one of them. There was some, but not a lot. I later lived in DC and later in NYC with my husband where he was a teacher in the Bronx and I worked at an outplacement agency in midtown (where some companies send their employees they’ve laid off and they try to help them find new jobs). Both NYC and DC, but especially NYC changed our lives and perspectives forever. When we lived there is when I really started becoming aware of police brutality towards Black people. At first, I didn’t want to believe it was true. Not because I wanted to gaslight anyone but because I didn’t want to believe anyone who was supposed to protect us could have such strong biases that resulted in such tragedy. Overtime I began to see it was true and started speaking up about it and reading about biases we all may have and trying to examine them in myself. We try to be sensitive to others in all situations and have tried to teach LO to love everyone. We also have planned to move to a more diverse place after business school. We have been intentional in trying to buy books for LO that have people of all colors and books that talk about important movements. We’ve tried to make sure lots of the shows LO and us watch have representation. We felt like we were doing our part. We’ve since felt bad when we realized how wrong we were. We’ve made specific goals for how to be better.

A few weeks ago I started Brené Brown’s book, “Dare to Lead”. I’ve mentioned quite a bit on my IG that it’s for everyone, not just bosses in the workplace. She talks about how courage is one of the guiding principles in her life and this is why when she’s confronted with racism, homophobia, sexism, etc., she has to address it. Someone asked her how to talk about race and she responded that you don’t. First, you listen. You’re going to make mistakes, but be open to learning and correcting yourself. This has been on repeat in my mind

This last week, I had a slap in the face realization that what we were previously doing wasn’t enough. We accepted that that was the way things were and tried to be accepting and loving of all and teach LO to do the same. We spoke up about it, but not enough. This past week we’ve been so grateful for all who are under no obligation to share stories that I know were difficult explaining how racism, especially systemic racism has affected them in their lives. We’ve listened and when we felt defensive, we’ve reminded ourselves not to and to listen harder. I think of how when I express to someone that something is sexist, I expect them to listen, not to gaslight me. I try to consistently remind myself when listening to the experiences of people of color that it’s my responsibility to listen, believe, and act. Brené Brown’s advice has been on repeat in my mind. Here is what we’ve learned this past week and how we plan to continue learning in no particular order.

1. Another thing I’ve read and loved is that it’s not enough to not be a racist, you have to be actively anti-racist.
2. I’ve heard a lot of Black and POC say that we can’t just expect POC to be our personal teachers and hold our hands through this. If they’re choosing to speak out, write books, etc. listen, follow their lead, but just because they are Black or a POC, doesn’t mean they’re open for Q&A. I hope I knew this, but it’s worth mentioning.
3. I’ve read about how all humans have bias, all White people have benefited off of systemic and cultural racism, oftentimes subtle, oftentimes not. This week we’ve realized it goes so much deeper than we previously realized and we are committed to learning more about that and doing all we can to weed it out.
4. We’ve thought about how this applies to people of all races and colors and we want to apply the above reasoning when thinking about all of them
5. It’s made me wonder what other areas of life I know are wrong but I’ve just accepted? I’m doing a lot of introspection to try and identify and learn what steps I can take
6. From the amount of people’s personal stories I have read, including their stories of the first time they were called the “N” word, it seems likely that every Black person has been called it at least once. This shocking and horrifying.
7. Many White people don’t want to talk to their kids abt racism because they don’t want to shatter their innocence and want their kids to be “colorblind” but Black people have no choice. This choice many White parents make exacerbates the problem and leaves them and their kids oblivious resulting in being unable to fight for what’s right and left to unintentionally say and do hurtful things

What we are doing and will continue to do:

• Buying more books for LO with more representation that aren’t necessarily abt race, but just fun kids books in addition to ones talking about important movements, race, and accurate history. Here are some that we have and like: Everyday Babies (One of my favorites! Shows different races and all kinds of families), Little Heroes series (we want to buy the whole series!) – Courageous People Who Changed the World, Indestructibles books- Jingle Baby. Here are some we plan to buy: “Love is” by Diane Adams, “I am enough” by Grace Byers, “Imani’s Moon” by Janae Brown-Wood. We plan to buy 1 book a month to stay budget friendly (we will continue this until we feel our library represents what we believe in).
• Researched and found books to help us see through different lenses and make meaningful changes. It’s fiction, but “Shadow if a Quarter Moon” was really eye opening to me. I’m currently reading “White Fragility” and Dal will read it next. I can’t recommend it enough. Every single thing I read from it I think, “ooh, I need to write that down!” The books I will read next are: “Mindful of Race” by Ruth King, “How To Be Less Stupid About Race”. by Crystal Fleming, and “I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness” by Austin Channing Brown. Again, there are many more, but those are just a few from our list.
• Realizing I want to read more books from people of color, not purely about race but about life to support others and see through new lenses. My favorite is “Becoming” by Michelle Obama and also really like “Dreams of my Father” by Barack Obama. I love autobiographies and listen to mainly political ones (on both sides) but was pretty shocked and disappointed to realize I did not have enough representation in the books I consume. Here are some on my list to read: “Sigh, Gone” by Phuc Tran, “Negroland” by Margo Jefferson, and “I’ll Never Write My Memoirs” by Grace Jones
• I also realized that while I’ve never picked a book, IG profile, or anything else based on anyone’s skin color, I realized that I’m not getting enough perspectives since my feed is a majority white women. Adding any Black or POC you can find obviously is not the right path and you may even feel it’s tokenism or worst, racist to seek out POC to follow on IG, but here’s why I don’t view it as that. All growing up, I noticed how absent women’s voices were from religion and history. I used to think “it’s just because there are hardly any voices to be heard there”, however, I later learned that if I want more representation from women in those spaces, I needed to make their voices heard even though sometimes it requires more research, when I’m giving a talk, I make it a point to have as much female representation as possible. While I listen to men’s voices as well, I find so much value in women’s voices and they often say just what I needed to hear. I realized it’s similar with representation from POC in all areas. I never just search food bloggers or anything else on IG, I usually add based on tags I see or suggested profiles I see that interest me. This has shown me I need to be FAR more intentional and add and interact with profiles of POC that resonate with me. I follow a lot of people and am in the process of going through who I follow to see who needs more representation in my feed including POC. There are a lot of accounts I was already following of POC, but not enough. Here are just a few I was already following and think are great: family life: Clan of Mine, food blogger: food blogger (focusing on Candida) Sherese Nicole , Adventures of a Lawyer Mom. Some new accounts I’ve followed and love. I’ve followed a lot, but here are a few of the food bloggers that I’m really liking: All The Healthy Things , The Delicious Antidote, and Sweet Potato Soul.
• We made a list of all LO’s favorite shows and examined them for representation. We know we want more. Here are some we want to introduce to LO: Prime: Blaze and the Monster Machines, and here are some that were already LO’s favorite: Disney +: Rising and Doc Mc Stuffins Prime Video or PBS: Daniel Tiger
• Made a list of shows, movies we want to watch to assist in our learning. Here are some we love: Netflix: Becoming, while fiction, CBS: All Rise, Bob Hearts Abishola, ABC: Mixedish and Blackish (I’ve only seen a few episodes) have taught me a lot! Here are some we plan to watch: Netflix: 13th, When They See Us, and Ted Talk: We Need To Talk About An Injustice

Here’s a list of lots of great options Parade.com- Anti Racist Sources .

Dal and I look at even what we felt two weeks ago and feel badly that we knew racism was alive and well yet thought we were doing our part. I don’t know how to eliminate racism, but I know that by examining and rooting it out in ourselves and our little family and most importantly by listening to Black people and other POC who choose to speak out, we can learn what they need from us, we can learn how to be better and how to do our best to weed out racism in the world around us.

I’m sure I’ve said things wrong in this post, but the most important thing to me is that I’m listening, trying my best, and ready to correct when and I do mean when I make mistakes. I also wanted to write this to publicly acknowledge that though my IG will no longer solely be featuring the voices of POC like it was this week, I will not forget, I will continue learning and talking about it while I share my content. Especially when I do Friday favorites on IG, I will regularly try to talk abt what I’m learning

I shudder to look back at many naive and privileged perspectives I had and know that down the road I’ll look back at now and realize how naive and privileged some perspectives were, but I remain committed to learning and growing. If you are also in the process of learning how to better in this regard, I would love your insights and what has helped you.