Walking with Whiteness Module 5 Self-Study

Walking with Whiteness Module Five: Navigating Racial Conflict with Intention Does conflict need to be an end point? What if it became a beginning point? How can we slow down our reactions in conflict to avoid further perpetuating cultural trauma?

This Module introduces the concept of Accountability as an intentional Heart practice, and curiosity and listening practices as forms of active love that can help us to stay in our hearts to regulate our nervous systems as we navigate conflict.

Vocabulary: Innocent Perception Empathic Listening Somatic Practices Recordings: Somatic Situational Rewrite Destination Vibration for Conversations About Race Destination Vibration for Cultivating Heart-Based Relationships Concepts: Innocent Perception: Most of us move throughout the world from the place of the Ego Mind, which is continuously utilizing categorization and judgement to maintain an illusion of safety and control. While this can be helpful for situations such as when to

cross the road, or when to keep working and when to take a break, it’s not the most helpful way of engaging with each other as complex humans. Humans can’t be right or wrong. We just ARE! When we being to shift into a place of Heart, we necessarily shift how we engage with each other and ourselves. Rather than viewing each other in binary terms of “good” or “bad,” “right” or “wrong,” we can shift to seek to understand ourselves and each other rather than to simply “know.”

Innocent perception is a tool that allows us to re-enter a child-like state where we engage with the world around us from a place of curiosity and awe: I wonder why they are doing that? I wonder why I said that? Isn’t this situation fascinating?

As we rewire ourselves to suspend judgment, we come to a place of being able to witness what is happening around us. This doesn’t mean that we won’t shift into a place of judgement about a situation at some point, but it does mean that we are not being unconsciously dragged around by judgement.

Innocent Perception allows us to engage with the world from a place of wanting to understand rather than a place of needing to be right. It is an open stance that allows us to take in the data before we interpret it.

Innocent Perception becomes very important for learning new pathways of social relations as we are interacting with people from very different experiences, patterning, cultural grooming, embodiments, belief systems, worldviews, frames of reference, and communication styles.

Empathic Listening: Most of us listen in conversation simply to determine what we will say next, how to best respond--not to

simply receive. Empathic Listening does not listen to respond.

Empathic Listening simply listens to listen. Empathic Listening is a whole body form of listening that pays attention to the energetics of the speaker and their words, how the words are received in our body, and non-verbal cues.

Empathic Listening allows us to try on what is being told to us from the perspective and experience of the speaker. We are able to energetically feel the emotions of the speaker and try them on in our body. For this brief window, we are able to gain valuable information about their life from their experience and perspective. The more we can open to this, the more we can learn how to de-center our own experience and way of being.

When we allow ourselves to simply witness and receive the experience of another, we will often find ourselves taking on a humbler posture. It also teaches us how to honor ourselves and another simultaneously. When engaging in Empathic Listening it’s not our job to judge, respond, fix, or help. It is simply our job to hold space, witness, and be present with the what is.

Imagine what would happen if Empathic Listening became our dominant mode of communication in society.

Practices: Innocent Perception: This week note how your mind responds to undesired situations and circumstances. Rather than rushing to “know,” or judging a situation as “good” or “bad,” see if you can begin to stay curious about what is happening around you. Note any overarching mind patterns that prevent you from staying with the full “what is” of a situation. As we begin to train the mind to

become more flexible and curious, we allow ourselves to stay in heart and in the present moment.

Begin with a thought that you are having about an event in your life. Ask yourself: •

•

Is this thought true? How do I absolutely know that it is true? Could something else be true?

Is this thought helpful? Is it taking me out of the present moment?

From here, consider people and ideas that you have a hard time understanding. Rather than assuming that you know where these thoughts, words, and actions are coming from, see if you can interrupt the runaway train of the mind to come back to a place of curiosity. Try asking yourself: •

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

Where is my judgement coming from around this person/idea?

Is it true that I know what is leading this person/people to say/do these things?

Is it true that this person/people is deliberately trying to cause pain by saying/doing these things?

Is it possible that this person does not understand the consequences of their thoughts/words?

What context do I have for understanding this person/situation?

Can I try on their perspective to see how they might be experiencing this situation/idea?

What am I being asked to learn in this situation? About myself? About them?

What does love look like in this situation?

•

How can I respond to this person from a place of love?

Now watch yourself respond to a situation you are having difficulty accepting. Ask yourself: •

•

•

Can I stay curious and fascinated by this situation instead of judging it?

Am I able to collect the “data” without jumping to value judgments?

Am I able to navigate the uncertainty and ambiguity of the situation without trying to control it or “know” the “right” way?

Empathic Listening: This week begin to notice how you are showing up to engage in conversations with those around you.

Empathic Listening can be especially powerful when done in conversation with someone who challenges you. During your conversation: •

•

Witness what you are experiencing in your body. Bring attention to your breath and do a body scan to notice what is coming up for you.

Notice what your comfort zone is in conversation with this person, without judgment. You are just getting the data: o Do you tend to want to give advice, fix, or help? o Do you zone out and think about what you have to do later? o Do you think about how you will respond to them? o Do you go to judgement or frustration?

•

Use your breath to bring you back to a state of presence.

•

•

•

Avoid any tendency to want to comfort (physical touch, concerned gaze, nodding) See if you can maintain a sense of neutrality in your body as you listen.

Set an intention to embody Innocent Perception. Simply witness, from a place of curiosity whatever it is they are saying.

Once you are able to bring yourself to the place of witness, you might:

•

•

•

•

Begin to practice “trying on” from your perspective what they might be feeling.

Sense into any non-verbal communication or energetic information that you are able to plug into beyond their words Bring awareness to any judgement or resistance happening in your body to what they are sharing with you. Use your breath and Feel and Process tools to accept whatever vibrations are moving through you.

Acknowledge any rising discomfort about rewiring your listening patterns Following the conversation:

•

•

Ask yourself, did you learn? What new lessons or information did you receive—about them, yourself, the world—simply by listening from a place of presence?

Ask yourself, how did they seem to respond to this form of listening?

Journaling Prompts:

• What do you learn about yourself as you bring attention to your listening and observing patterns?

• Consider Sheri Mitchell’s “Decolonizing”: o What is your understanding of decolonization? o In what ways is your own personal consciousness colonized based on the examples Mitchell provides? o What connections can you see between white supremacy culture and colonization? o What are ways that you can imagine beginning to decolonizing your daily life, mind patterns, belief systems, and consciousness? Remember, 1% shifts add up!

• Radical Dharma introduces a contemplative, heart-based approach to social justice and collective healing. It offers a more compassionate approach where social justice principles are offered in the spirit of “living into”— embodying and practicing love for community more so than being “good” or “right.” There is no room for shame and guilt here. It focuses on the importance of an embodied somatic practice as a means of disrupting white supremacy culture, and seeks a liberatory, inclusive path that disrupts binary logics between “us” and “them” logics, and honors intentions while realizing that conflict and mistakes are inevitable. It is a form of living, breathing praxis (theory + practice) premised on witnessing, listening, taking accountability, dreaming, and growing into together. It is a collective practice rooted in mirroring that brings attention to how we are showing up in relationship.

Consider the ideas and premises put forward in these excerpts: o What blueprints, methods, and templates do they offer in terms of navigating racial conflict with intention? o What blueprints, methods, and templates do they offer in cultivating more honest, authentic, compassionate, heart-based communities that intentionally bridge racial identities? o How do the principles of collaboration, cooperation, collectivity, and community work against white supremacist and colonial paradigms that are focused on hierarchical power structures, individualism, and “us” and “them” logics? o The second excerpt begins to interrogate racial identity at a deeper level, suggesting that there is a person/soul that exists before these social identities come to be, that racial identity both is and is not real, and that race itself is not a problem—it’s our relationship to it that is.

What do you make of these ideas? o Consider the decision to present the second excerpt as a dialogue—how can this be considered a possible way of moving forward through racial conflict and tension? o What other questions and/or possibilities do these potentials open up for you?

• The ideas put forth by cultural critic Ayishat Akanbi put forth potentially controversial ideas in their critiques of “wokeness” and “cancel culture.” o Notice your own embodied responses to the ideas that Akanbi shares.

o How might we differentiate Akanbi’s engagements with these concepts from more right wing/conversative engagements with them? o How might Akanbi’s interventions in cancel culture and wokeness provide tools for a more compassionate, heart-based form of navigating racial conflict?