It’s bewildering to witness crimes against Black lives and racial injustice in 2020. The events of the last several days are life-changing and have everything to do with parenting. Whether you feel this way or not just yet, I want to underscore that change IS coming. We have to make space for it.

As parents, we are in the process of raising the next generation. If we want the world to change, we need to remember that we as parents are always planting seeds. Intentionally or not, we transmit our beliefs and biases onto our children.

The environment in which we are raising our children turns those biases into “truths”, unless it is specifically designed to question and challenge them (more on that in Episode 012). So if we want the world to change, this is something we have to do proactively.

Since most of our lessons and messages to children are delivered through our Parenting Presence, on the issue of race we also start by looking within ourselves.

We always react to what we see with a thought and a feeling, and these are based on beliefs that have been shaped over the years. Some of these serve us well, and others are grotesquely outdated.

Along with raising our own awareness of biases and our own inner re-shaping, we need to get in touch with beliefs and values introduced to us from early on. When we do this work ourselves, we will be able to introduce values and beliefs to our children in such a way that our children learn to see all ethnicities and races as something that is comfortable and familiar, rather than different and uncomfortable.

We have a lot of work to do as parents. Not waiting for the “world” to change, but by being the ones that change it. And even taking it a step deeper — to be the ones that change it, we need to be the ones that change ourselves.

It is not enough to say “I am not racist.” Why? Because our identity is not formed by what we are NOT.

Instead, it is defined by what we ARE. And so the place we want to arrive at is to be able to say with comfort and confidence “I am antiracist.” Our true identity is built on action. Not doing something is, therefore, not part of our identity. Doing something — is. When something is part of our identity, it plays out on a daily basis.

When I am an antiracist, I know what I am doing specifically, I know what I think, what I say and do when no one is watching as well as when everyone is watching, and make sure those things are aligned. 

Our identity is shaped by and is contained in values and beliefs. When our values and beliefs shift, our identity shifts as well. We will not be perfect in this process, and it is OK to be “an antiracist in progress” as we shape this part of our identity.