The Racial Revolution in 2020 has been wrought with a heavy, righteous, and long-overdue mixed bag of responsibility. BIPOC are rightfully tired of fighting for justice only to fall on the deaf ears of white supremacist policies. Racist ideologies are so insidiously interwoven into our society that it takes relentless exposure to the murder of black men* at the hands of police for us to realize its truth.
It is no wonder there is the fury. The uproar has had to be loud enough for those still asleep to awaken to its rumble.
This is a time for a collective reckoning that only those too fragile and preoccupied can be blocked enough to ignore.
White and white-adjacent people have been too long complicit in supporting oppressive systems. Unconsciously, unwittingly, unintentionally, and so devotedly.
It calls us to question everything. What we were taught and the ways we’ve been lied to. We are being called to question why that is, and what we can do about it. How can we reclaim our sovereign right to think for ourselves and to be free of the conditioning that has led us to other each other? Why is it taking us so long to repair and change?
There is something so ungrounding about implicitly housing bias that was never mine to begin with. It’s an upsetting reality. But no worse than those who have suffered from its vehement longevity.
We owe BIPOC lifetimes of reparations.
After a week on Instagram listening and reposting only voices of black teachers, educators, healers, and activists, I consider next steps. I ask myself how I will remain active in my ongoing deconstruction of white supremacy and in my commitment as an anti-racist accomplice. How can I more strongly support pro-blackness? My own experiences of oppression as a Jewish womxn tap into my bones the pain of the plight. I am a humble and dedicated accomplice in the call for undiscerning liberation. I am also aware of how much work I still have to do. The journey is lifelong. I’ve been hurt, humbled, and inspired in my learning these last few weeks.
How and Why Our Inner Children Matter When It Comes To Anti-Racism:
1) Our inner children were the ones indoctrinated with lies.
2) Our inner children are the ones that continue to carry those beliefs and become triggered when they’re challenged.
3) The science of neurobiology tells us that by our mid-20’s neural pathways are solidified but plastic. Which means we can unlearn what our inner children were taught and so believed, and reteach them.
How Intersections of Personal Trauma Offers Complexity:
Childhood trauma and unhealed attachment injuries may be barriers to full-fledged anti-racism work.
Why?
We all carry wounds from childhood. If we haven’t done the work to reparent those wounds, they remain infected parts of our psyche that limit our perceptions. Unhealed trauma distorts our sense of self and how we see and experience others. Inner child healing is a way to cultivate clear seeing. When we find ourselves amidst the muck of our own past pains, we strengthen our ego. We’re not bad, wrong, or broken people here. We’re hurt people who haven’t gotten the healing we need to do higher-order work in the world.
Why Inner Child Healing Helps and How it May Show Up:
1) It gives you the chance to love yourself in the places in you that are young (in age) and old (in wounding).
2) Anti-Racism work needs you to open yourself beyond yourself. The work isn’t about you, it’s about the collective and our shared world. Narcissism from your inner child may still be running the show (because its needs weren’t met, were abused or neglected). The child’s mind makes this mean something about it. That it was bad, or not enough, or undeserving. The shame spiral here can be enough to deter someone from the work. When you can see that scared and shame-ridden part for what it is, you can lean into it with gentle and kind care. And pursue what is not personal but a responsibility for humanity.
3) Resocializing our inner children means we commit to diversity in our everyday lives. We choose to live in diverse communities and support diverse business-owners. We look to BIPOC for leadership. We deconstruct the ideas that white is center. We offer our inner children a new paradigm where white is not supreme.
Reparenting might mean cultivating great compassion and patience towards ourselves as we do this work. It may be creating a discipline for anti-racist learning. It may be firmer boundaries and more assertiveness in what we allow (e.g. speaking up against racist speech or any stereotype abuse or microaggression of any kind).
Reteaching means exposing our inner children to the learning they should have but did not get in school growing up. It means reading from BIPOC, taking workshops, being in white affinity groups. Retreaching your inner children may be reflecting on your own racial identity development. We can stay open to the lifelong learning that’s required to be an accomplice to a liberated world for all marginalized beings.
When we can see what we’ve inherited from the lens of our inner children, we realize we’re the product of our conditioning. Until we put in the awareness-work to decondition, we’re operating from a place that often times isn’t true to us. This isn’t our fault but it is our responsibility.
Whether you choose to heal your inner children, or show up in some other meaningful way is up to you. I only implore you to consider your own wounds and how they may be keeping you from showing up in this world the way you’re most meant to.
For a comprehensive list of Anti-Racism and Activist Resources, email me at heydrrachel@gmail.com. Current favorites: Ibram X Kendi’s How To Be An Antiracist and Me and White Supremecy by Layla F. Saad. Also anything written by Audre Lorde and bell hooks.
If you’re in need of any aspect of healing and transformation, work with me directly either through 1:1 or my self-paced workshop.
*black womxn are also brutally murdered by police with far less exposure. A symptom of the intersections of racism and patriarchy that’s woven into our fight for justice overall.
