Am I the only one feeling this way?
Yes, the protests—peaceful or not—have led to incredible changes. Companies are hiring more blacks. Communities are implementing radical police reforms. The shares in black-owned businesses are soaring.
But to create true and lasting equality, we must look beyond the external. To change the collective, we need to transform the individual.
I say this from experience.
I came of age during Women’s Lib. Enraged by rampant discrimination, we took to the streets, burning our bras, demanding gender equality. And lo and behold, the workplace opened its doors, albeit a crack. The banks gave us credit cards without requiring a man’s signature.
But where we are, some fifty years later? Far from full equality in pay or position. Far from eradicating misogyny or gender bias.
I can hear some of you gasp: how dare I compare the black experience with women’s history. But the underlying dynamics of discrimination and oppression are the same.
Whether sold as slaves or burned at the stake, each of us must heal the cumulative trauma and shame we’ve suffered for centuries. No matter how many new opportunities now await, we can only go as far as our own indoctrinated beliefs and distorted self-image will allow.
“Seek not to change the world,” A Course in Miracles insists, “but change your mind about the world.”
Unless we change our thinking, rewiring our brain, we can’t possibly act differently and nothing will change. Or as one woman wrote to me: “We all contribute (or contaminate) from our own level of consciousness.”
It all boils down to this. Unless we love and respect ourselves, we can’t possibly expect that from others. What change can you make in your thinking to help bring about the change the world so desperately needs? Leave me a comment below.
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