An Intentional Way of Being

We are conceived in relationship. It may be a healthy and loving relationship, a spontaneous expression of care, or a violent act of rape. Even if conceived through a medical procedure, a relationship exists between a patient and her medical team. During the period between conception and birth, we are nurtured in relationship within our birth mother.

After birth, we proceed to be in relationship with a birth, adoptive or foster family. For almost two decades we are formed deeply by the common but unique lived experiences of family. There are many variables including other relationships impacting these familial relationships. What we may consider to be normal may be unfamiliar in other families. It takes time and critical thinking to recognize how patterns and idiosyncrasies are manifest.

I am grateful to have been nurtured and formed in the relationships of a multi-generational family less than 30 miles from where my parents were primarily nurtured and formed. It was common for our immediate family to visit members of our extended family on a weekly basis. From this proximity, it was possible to recognize differences in the relationships and dynamics of individual families.

We also had family members who moved during the Great Migration. Every other summer, we would make a roadtrip to spend time with them and to sustain these long-distance relationships. Whether in Alabama or Ohio, there were idiosyncrasies in each family with a common thread of respecting the elders.

I use this understanding in an attempt to make sense of how so many people accept or dismiss cruelty and violence. Some may have been formed by lived experiences in which these behaviors were common practice. They may have been forced to accept brutality as a survival technique. We often hear reports of bullying in schools, but many experience it at home.

The majority of people in white bodies have been groomed to ignore the systemic cruelty and violence towards those on the margins. This is affirmed as they worship at the altar of whiteness. Even those dwelling in poverty have been desensitized from acknowledging their own basic needs for the empty claim of being white. Perceived privilege is the only value as it provides neither food nor shelter.

While my kidnapped and enslaved ancestors suffered brutality at the hands of others, they maintained a holistic African wisdom that affirmed their humanity. They may have acquiesced to simply survive, but in the sanctity of home they taught their children the truth of their God-given identity. Amidst the constant cruelty and violence, they instructed them on how to survive in an unjust and corrupt system, to think critically and to discern the hearts of people.

This is why 92 percent of women in Black bodies did not vote for the person currently in the Office of the President of the United States of America. Having dwelt on this land and under this government for centuries, we know its history - the whitewashed version and the lived experiences of our mothers, fathers and other elders. Living with intergenerational trauma, we recognize the long-lived patterns resulting from the struggle between the ideals of democracy, and the privilege of excessive wealth.

This struggle is inherent to the nation and her people. It was conceived before the founding of the nation through the lies of self-entitled colonizers who contaminated relationships with the people of the First Nations and the land. It was advanced by the kidnapping, importing, and enslavement of Africans. Throughout the nation’s history, many peoples have been considered as threats to the nation because of their color, faith, gender, immigration status or sexual orientation. When is attention given to greedy, self-indulgent and wealthy men in white bodies who use their wealth to buy favor and privilege? This is the unaddressed entitlement, forebear of all others.

The legacy of the nation’s struggle is a curse on the relationships of each generation until all people are liberated to recognize and embody their own human dignity beyond power, privilege, wealth and whiteness. Simultaneously, there must be an awakening and acknowledgement of the human dignity of others, of all others. It must become an intentional way of being. This can be accomplished but neither in my lifetime nor in this century.

We can begin the multi-faceted healing work in our relationships by leaning into the discomfort of removing and documenting the stench of whitewashing from our national narratives; by teaching children truth; and by planting seeds of democracy, diversity, equity, inclusion, justice and right relationship. If the democracy survives another 250 years, the people of 2276 may genuinely celebrate in truth what we cannot.