Being less defensive allows us to learn.
“Did you mean to say, ‘colored people?” I feel the blood rush to my head a flush spread across my face. Internally, I think ‘did a really just blunder like that, was I really that stupid!?’ And I know that I just mixed up my words in a passionate sentence and I put things in the wrong order, of course, it is ‘people of color’ as the most appropriate choice of words, but my internal dialog is still wondering what is the right way to refer to races other than my own, and just in general feeling like I royally fucked up, I hate that there is separation, and otherness, I used to be ‘color blind,’ now I know better. I bit my tongue and did all my “tricks” to regulate and then I deeply genuinely apologized for my language to the black women sitting on my computer screen. I suspect I have lost her trust and it is fair, we just met she doesn’t really know me, and I don’t really know her. I know that being defensive or making this about me isn’t the right action. We finish up our conversation and three weeks later I am still digesting this conversation and my fuck up. I am following my personal mental patterns making this be a pervasive event and making this exchange mean more than I need to, AND I don’t want to miss anything that I could be learning, I don’t want to be doing the ‘wrong’ thing.
The reality is I couldn’t want more to create new anti-racist structures where BIPOC are treated with equity. I want to create a new America, and I am awkward and don’t know where to begin, but I know it isn’t just falling silent because I have already spent years doing that. For those years I carry the guilt that now propels me into action and acts as a fire for me to keep pushing even when I am tired and worried about a million things like my kids and COVID 19. And the thing is this is the most important thing.
From this and the readings, I have been doing the thing I know is if you have the opportunity to be called out, be grateful, and not defensive. Be curious, apologetic, and humble. When we bring defensiveness as our armor against embarrassment or in defense of our righteousness, we are hurting ourselves and others. So fellow white people take a step back, get curious, and drop defensiveness. When you feel your chest tighten and face flush curl your toes up tightly in your shoes hold and release repeat 5x, breathe, and if you need to ask for a moment to breathe a bit more, do, regulate yourself and then come back to the conversation humble. Be honored by someone’s willingness to care about you deeply enough to correct you. Remember the conversation you are having is probably very important so don’t skip it regulate and get present. Keep being willing to show up in uncomfortable spaces, be willing to be wrong, that is part of our shared journey as humans so don’t pretend that you can skip it.
