personal growth

Many white people I talk to about the roles we play in upholding white supremacy in the USA recall the time when Mike Brown was murdered as pivotal in their racial development. It was then that some of us who are white started to face the truth that our systems (legal, educational, health, political, and more) are set up as if Black lives don’t matter. And, it was then that mainstream media shared stories of how Black families often have to have “the talk” with their children, especially their boys, about how to stay safe when the police approach them. And, more generally, how Black parents too often are forced by everyday racism to educate their babies about how dangerous and harmful white people and the systems of our country can be. I write this and I feel deep grief in my body. Those babies. They shouldn’t have to be taught the world is going to hurt them. But it is a reality for so many (most, as I understand it) parents of children who are Black.

Sometimes I talk about how whiteness prevents me from being fully human. Part of that emptiness, those parts of myself that aren’t completely and deeply in humanity, involves coping with the ugliest realities of everyday life. Because whiteness has allowed me to believe the world is mostly good, and because whiteness has given me generations of cellular-level denial skills when faced with violence and injustice, I don’t have a lot of practice holding conflicting truths together at the same time.

Today, when my 14 year old’s school announced the police department has received a text that there was an “active shooter” at her school and that the school had been evacuated, I was flooded with adrenaline. (The message was a hoax, there was no shooter.) As I’ve been recovering from the terrifying roller coaster of today, I’m reflecting on how unfair it is that Black families don’t get to protect their children the way I’ve been able to for the most part almost entirely (until today, in some respects). Just thinking about it fills me with such rage I can’t even think straight. I’m also full of rage that our country has so many guns. I’m full of rage that people aren’t getting the kind of support they need — that someone thought it a good idea to send that hoax text.

I gave my children a white family’s version of “the talk” when they were very young. I felt like I was breaking rules, telling my children really scary stuff about how police can be dangerous especially for Black people, among other things. I’ve continued to have conversations about how fucked up our racialized capitalism systems are, how unfair it is that Black children don’t get to feel as safe as they get to. I’ve also talked with them now that they are older about how we, as white people, need to build skills that will allow us to stay in the truth: evil exists. Evil. And we, white people in the USA, are helping evil continue in large part because we don’t have the skills to be even just a little uncomfortable. These are, of course, mostly intellectual exercises. Breaking free from whiteness requires these steps, though, as far as I understand it.

We white people need to learn how to be uncomfortable. To hold conflicting truths — there is evil and violence and oppression AND there is beauty and joy and solidarity — at the same time. We need to practice and practice and practice so we can become fully human.

[Note: I’m aware that the sweeping generalizations I’m making in this series of posts don’t apply to everyone. We are a complicated species with loads and loads of influences and motivations for our behavior. I write these for white people like me who want to break free from the prison of white supremacy culture so we can live in solidarity with everyone and everything.]

Note: This post is about me as a white woman dealing with my racism, written mostly for readers who are white, though of course anyone is welcome to read.

Twenty seven years ago today (it’s just past midnight on July 2), I spent 24 hours not drinking or using drugs. Twenty seven years ago tomorrow, I went to my first 12-step recovery meeting. I haven’t found it necessary to take a drink or misuse other drugs since then. I’ve written about my recovery story a few times on my blog (here, here, and here, for example). The short version of that story is I found out in 1996 that I have an allergy to alcohol. If I drink even a little bit of it, I have a reaction that becomes overwhelming: I need another drink. I also am not able to remember fact this 100% of the time. I had to build a spiritual life that included a power greater than me (I call it god) to keep me connected to that truth. These days, not drinking is something I pretty much only think about when I’m in fellowship with other alcoholics. It’s not a big deal to me at all. I’m grateful, and I love living in recovery.

That said, as I consider my recovery story tonight, I’m reflecting about the ways I use the tools of a 12-step program to learn to break free from my addiction to whiteness.

When I say “whiteness,” I don’t mean the color of my skin which of course I can’t change, though being white plays a role. A quick Google (google is our friend, my fellow white people!) pulls up a concise definition shared on the National Museum of African American History & Culture website, “Whiteness and white racialized identity refer to the way that white people, their customs, culture, and beliefs operate as the standard by which all other groups of are compared.” I sometimes refer to it interchangeably as “white supremacy culture,” though there are probably nuanced differences I miss when I do that.

Using whiteness, even when I didn’t know I was, has done for me what drugs and alcohol did (for a while, until they stopped working) — it keeps me numb. My recovery from my addiction to whiteness and white supremacy culture is about being different, moving differently in the world. I don’t have a checklist, this is not a linear path I will complete after x, y, z tasks. One of the most important and effective part of this recovery is learning how to stay in my body.

Following Resmaa Menakem‘s way of using the phrase, “somatic abolition,” combined with embodiment practices shared in trainings led by Rev. angel Kyodo williams, author of Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love, and Liberation, as well as therapy, 12-step recovery, and Quaker worship, among many many other resources* I am learning how to stay in my body so I can, among many other important things, actually face the truth of — words fail me so much, and I’m a writer! — the horrors of the ongoing and historical oppression of Black and brown bodied people and the ways white people like me have also suffered.

Facing the truth means uncovering the layers and levels of denial that are baked into my DNA as an individual, and are the default way of being for me and my white peers. It requires a lot of therapy and a lot of practice. I’ve had to find places where I can process the levels of pain and despair that feel like they might destroy me when I consider what my blood ancestors did, for example. I’ve had to build skills — and oh my goodness, I am so new at this! — to be able to stay present in my body when I face how much I’ve benefitted from systems and structures that have brutalized and continue to brutalize people.

As I mentioned above, words fail when I try to talk about the injustice of these systems that keep me and my white peers from being fully human and literally threaten the lives of Black people every day. It seems like no matter how much I try to write about these things, I can never capture all of the complexities. I can never do it justice. But I still do write about it, some. I write about it (imperfectly) because it has been my experience that we white people need to get out into the open the things we hide even from ourselves. I write about it so other white people might look at themselves, too. Rev. angel talks about having closets full of crap (I’m very very loosely quoting here) that we’re trying so hard to keep hidden and it takes so much energy to keep it hidden, we’re never fully able to be present. I think of it as what prevents us white people from being fully human.

In addition to therapy, addressing my own specific experiences of trauma, learning to stay in my body, finding space and communities where healing is possible, I also depend deeply on my spiritual life to break free from whiteness. Just like alcohol, that the book Alcoholics Anonymous refers to as “cunning, baffling, and powerful,” whiteness is slippery and tricky and whispers to me all the reasons I don’t need to be on this transformational path. I’m someone who spends quite a bit of energy on this practice and just the other day I was a seriously racist jackass to a dear friend. If I’m ever going to be able to play a part in movements of solidarity, I need to get my own stuff in order. (I made amends to my friend as a part of a much broader conversation.) And also, I can’t wait until I’m “done” before I work against the existing systems of oppression, because, the fact is the more I learn, the more I know I don’t know. I’ll never be “done.” I need a spiritual connection to a higher power to keep me in the truth: my humanity depends on breaking free from whiteness even if so many strong forces around me are crying out for me to stay in the numbness.

The process of dropping the weapons of whiteness leaves me vulnerable in ways that are absolutely terrifying. I have to trust and rely on god as well as the grounding/embodiment practices I’ve picked up along the way. The identity shifting that’s been happening over the last decade or so has taught me that life outside of white supremacy culture is deeper and more joyful (and painful!) than anything I’ve known before. It opens of channels of imagination (and I feel whiteness trying to shut it down!) that I believe are part of the keys to a better world for all of us, together.

 

* I’ve worked with an extraordinarily gifted consultant as part of this growth, and I’m currently reading (very slowly) Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto and Braiding Sweetgrass.

There’s no reason I should have to explain to people why I behave the way I do when it comes to COVID-19 precautions, obviously. That said, there are a lot of times I want to explain them.

Most people I know are vaccinated, wear masks in crowded public spaces and/or indoors, and are generally led by the science that tells us about the layers of protection we need to keep ourselves and others safe. But, most people I know (not all, for sure, but most) have higher risk tolerance levels than I do. And I want to just write a little bit about my “why.”

Why am I not comfortable meeting people in person (unless it’s just two of us and we’ll be walking outside among the trees), going to my 12 step recovery group in person, attending Meeting for Worship in person, and other activities that might be slightly higher risk but generally speaking are not super-risky?

First of all, I’m still of the belief that if I *can* eliminate chances of picking up COVID-19 and passing it along to someone else, I should eliminate those chances. So, if there’s a risk I can skip, I skip it. But it’s not only about protecting other people.

Every day, I live with an autoimmune disorder (rheumatoid arthritis) that has a frustrating and often overwhelming range of symptoms; it is emotionally exhausting. My immune system is attacking healthy parts of me. Add to that gastrointestinal issues like diverticulosis and IBS, menopausal brain fog, continued recovery from a traumatic brain injury… my body hasn’t been all that dependable for me. That sucks. So, the prospect of “long COVID” — even if the odds of my getting it are miniscule — feels like the straw that would break this camel’s back. Another health issue with mind-fuckery as a symptom? No freakin’ thank you.

Then, add to that the fact that the pandemic has brought out my tendency towards anxiety. With a strong spiritual life I had been living in a place of relative peace and serenity regarding those things that I can’t control. It was lovely. Well… now I’m someone who if I get a little cough for a moment or two (despite having been essentially nowhere and knowing full well I’m allergic to cats and we have a cat so of course I deal with sinus/chest nonsense) I will worry. I will worry I have COVID-19. This worry does not have to be born of fact, but the worry will simmer under all I am doing even if it “shouldn’t.” Most of my immediate family has these tendencies, too. So, again, if I can eliminate a risk, I’m going to eliminate it.

Thanks for reading this. I’m not even sure why I’m posting it, but I keep wanting to explain why I’m not participating in even relatively safe activities that so many people have resumed. So, I’m getting the explanation out of my system. :-)

The part of my racism story I want to share now is from 2007, though it includes a reference to the experiences I shared in my racism story, part 1 (or, “will you be my black friend?”). It’s my hope that my friends and peers who are white might read my stories and consider their own experiences as people in America who identify as white; who, therefore, benefit from the racist structures of our society. I have found it helpful over the years to get honest with myself about the flickering but problematic background thought processes that have blocked me from authentic relationships with people of color:
“she’s Black, she’s Black, she’s BLAAAAACK!”
“She’s Black, she’s Black, she’s BLAAAAACK!” was just about all my brain could handle. Maintaining a simple and polite conversation was barely possible. No matter how much we had in common, no matter how likely a future friendship, I could think of nothing but that amazing dark skin, the transcendent hair texture, and my entire personal history of race relationships. Oh, how I wanted to prove to this woman that I was not like just any white woman! I knew, of course, it was just this level of self-consciousness that would make me utterly annoying to her. But, I just couldn’t help myself.
Helping myself, though, is really what race relations is about for me these days. I do care about the greater socio-political issues (shocking disregard for people’s lives all across the continent of Africa, overt brutality in our country, job discrimination, and of course the list goes on). However, my personal journey with racism now centers around me, my husband, and most of all, my daughter…
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In the late 1990s, I began posting what I then called a “weekly column” or “web essay.” Long story short, I called the column “It’s All About Me! (the column).” These days, I’m not so convinced sharing my personal experiences will be of interest to others. Not because I think they are uninteresting, but because the www is flooded with post after post written by people who find themselves interesting.
I’ve missed writing about my experiences, though, on the ultra-personal level that personal blogging allows; my newspaper column must relate to current events and I must keep the readers in mind. I know that sharing my experience can benefit others, if only because they might feel less alone in their own foibles and peculiarities. But I also know that these days, we all need a lot of emotional energy to stay strong in the fight against fascism and I don’t want to add to the noise.
Posting here on this personal blog with very little traffic, I think I can play with those old experiences of sharing my stories and reaching readers while also not taking up any spotlight that should be shining on other voices. Maybe I can do some good without doing any harm.
 
 
 
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these dots and words are meant to keep the wordpress ads away from my post :-)