What the Eyes Can't See, The Heart Can't Feel.

One of the very first things you learn when you begin doing race consciousness work is that you MUST ground your learning in your own racial experience.  When I started this process a million years ago, I didn't even know I had a racial identity.  Turns out, most white people don't think we have a racial identity when we are first confronted with that question.

I know NOW, after almost two decades of doing this work, that 100% of my experience as a human being on this planet and ESPECIALLY in the United States, is racialized.  Race is everywhere. And it's okay to talk about it.

As they say in Spanish "Ojos que no ven, corazon que no siente".  Roughly translated, that means, "What the eyes can't/don't see, the heart can't/won't feel."

And once you get "woke", you can never be colorblind again.

As a white woman, living in the United States today, seeing how my white privilege LITERALLY protects my life in ways that do not extend to other members of my community, I just can't live with that and not do something every single day to try to interrupt that systemic racism.

That is why I teach the coursework that I teach.
That is why I actively seek out and have people of color as close personal intimate friends.

I have taken part and benefitted from a system of privilege for my entire life.  And I must do my part to share the wealth. That doesn't make me any less wealthy. I will not suffer.  I will only be better for it.

My life, my experiences, are richer and so much more beautiful because of the people of color in my life who have raised me up. Who have taught me when I have hurt, offended, and wounded them with my whiteness.  They have never turned their backs on me.  They have held me in loving accountability for my ignorance.  They have helped me grow and learn.  And I feel badly for relying on them for that.

It's not the job of the people of color in my life to teach me how to be more human and see and understand their experiences.  It is my job to do that.  And so,

I will ask questions.
I will make myself vulnerable and uncomfortable.
I will put myself in places where I can experience counter narratives to my own white experience.
I will stay engaged in this process even when it is easier to retreat into my safe "white" place.
I will do this because I have the privilege of being white and being safe and I have done nothing special to earn that. I was lucky enough to be born that way.