We Are All Lionesses: Setting An Intention To See The Very Best In Each Other
“I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional truth will have the final word in reality.”
— Martin Luther King Jr. —
Yesterday I attended a virtual anti-racism training which changed how I see hard conversations. It also helped me cultivate more love for others. And it all started with one simple question.
Before launching into the training, the trainer first asked us:
“What would you need to feel safe in this space”.
Racism is an emotional topic. Systemic racism is insidious, permeating and informing every aspect of many of our societies and certainly the global world order. Getting to the other side, dismantling systemic racism to create a different future, requires us to acknowledge the past and how racism shapes every aspect of our present.
For those of us working on climate change, we must confront the realities of how we got here. At the centre of the fight for climate justice is the uncomfortable truth that some lives matter more than others. Each of us, particularly white folks like me, also need to do the work to become anti-racists in our daily lives as well as in our work.
I have personally grappled with a lot of shame about the manifold of horrific acts my ancestors committed and the pain they perpetrated on others for centuries. I know I benefit from those actions in all aspects of my life. I know that wear so many layers of privilege. But I don’t understand the true depth of my privilege. The true scope of the costs. I know that I have unintentionally done harm to others but I don’t know the full extent of that harm, nor, if I’m honest, how to repair.
Shame by itself serves no one and does nothing. It can be paralyzing if we allow ourselves to steep ourselves in it. For a long time I did just that though. Felt ashamed while continuing to benefit from my “whiteness”. Then one day I realized how much harm I was doing. So, in recent years I’ve been able to channel my shame into action. I’ve been able to learn more and do better. While I still have so much to learn, I have done my best to better understand racism, how pervasive it is and how I can play a role in unravelling it.
As I learn more, I do do better.
But still there’s so much I don’t know that I don’t know and so much I can’t possibly understand. Which is why I appreciated so much that the trainer put so much emphasis on creating a safe place for us to learn and talk about racism. Because we will all stumble. What’s important is that we continue to strive to know more and do better.
One of the conditions we collectively agreed on in yesterday’s training was to assume that everyone in the container, all the students who had showed up on a Sunday morning to learn about how to be an anti-racist, had the best of intentions. That we wanted to do better.
That, more than any other condition we agreed on, helped me feel safe to learn and grow and ultimately, to do and be a little bit better than I did the day before. Setting that intention helped me feel more love for the others in the training. I was able to see them in the very best light because I agreed to do so.
So, as we set out on our journey to become warriors of love, let’s set an intention to see the very best in each other. To feel into each other’s hearts and see the beauty there. To know that we all want to do better. And that we all will do better as we learn to come back to love.
Because the truth is that none of us really know what we’re doing here. We’re all just fumbling around. And I really believe that almost all of us are just trying to do our very best with the tools we have.
As you go into a new week, I challenge you all to see the best in everyone you encounter and to see how it changes your life and ultimately, the world around you. Try this on and get comfortable with it and then next week we’ll turn our focus inwards (while continuing to love each other) to cultivate more love for ourselves.
Erin Roberts is a climate policy researcher and the founder of the Loss and Damage Collaboration, the Climate Leadership Initiative and The Lionesses. She believes that a world in which all humans, all other species and all ecosystems are thriving on a healthy planet is entirely possible. And that love is the only way to get there.
