I SEE YOU

People say, “I don’t see color.” I see color. I see you. I honor our differences. I am different from you and you are different from me, but we are also the same. We both feel, we both think, we both love, we are both someone’s child, grandchild, sister, brother, mother, father. We are both members of the same collective family. You ARE my brother. You ARE my sister.

The rich color of your skin is different in shade, but not in structure or function. It is skin just like mine and underneath it, there is flesh and bones just like me. Look deeper. There is a heart that loves and hurts just like mine. A heart that swells with passion, beats with joy and grows with nurturing. But a heart that also freezes in fear, braces against hatred, and shrinks from neglect.

When you tell someone, “I don’t see color” in a way you are saying “I don’t see you.”

I see you and all of the beauty you bring to the world, the wisdom you carry in you from your ancestors, and the cultural richness you have to share. I see me and all the beauty I bring to the world, the wisdom I carry from my ancestors, and the cultural richness I have to share. But I also see the painful truth that through the past generations of my ancestors there have been ignorant and heinous acts toward people of color. Words of hatred, wounds of neglect, and scars of torture. This is the shame that must be acknowledged so that it can be healed. I embrace all that I can learn from you and I commit to continuing to educate myself, through history, the words of race and identity theory scholars, civil rights activists, and by maintaining an open mind about that which I do not know or understand yet. I want to learn from you. I want to explore our differences, illuminate our commonalities, and celebrate our human bond.

When a person walks in the world afraid merely because of the color of their skin they are traumatized, forced to live on high alert, forced to doubt the value of their being, unable to trust the person beside them. My brothers and sisters should not have to live this way. See the color of each person's skin, but dig deeper to see the true depth of their being. Listen to their stories and learn from their wisdom, sit with the difficult history, and acknowledge the burden and pain they carry. By doing so you can then celebrate one another and grow as individuals and cement a stronger bond in our collective family.

When my niece came to visit shortly after she was adopted I loved to stroke her hair. It was different from my babies and it was beautiful - tufts of rich, soft, curly chenille. Her radiant, beautiful coloring was different, her bold, chiseled features were different. With each visit, she matured and the challenges of learning to care for her hair and skin was a topic of conversation with my sister-in-law. This was different and it inspired curiosity, openness to learning, a willingness to ask questions and acknowledge our ignorance. I am honored to bask in the beauty of her color and am proud of the racial diversity she and her brother bring to our family.

I have a niece and nephew who carry the richness of Japan through their veins. The hue of their skin is deeper and their beautiful eyes have a different shape than mine. They look different from me, but they see the same world I do and through their lens make a difference every day by embracing their heritage, sharing their stories, and paving the path for future generations to explore, accept, love, and celebrate the differences in our collective family.

I am white. I didn't do anything special to earn this societal privilege. This privilege allows me freedom, provides me opportunities that often I don’t even see because those doors have always been open merely because of the color of my skin, not because of the person I am, how smart I am, how honest I am, how generous I am. Not because of anything I do or have done, but simply because I am white.

I have the honor of being a somatic practitioner. I share space with people at their most vulnerable physically and emotionally. I touch skin of many colors and cradle heads with hair of different textures. But most importantly I have the fragile task of holding hearts. I have the privilege of being a confidant, a shoulder to cry on, celebrant of discovery, and participant in joyful laughter. I see that each person who comes through my door looks different and that is an important part of their life story. It cannot be ignored or overlooked, it must be acknowledged and honored. To truly see someone you must see all of them - the color of their skin, the origins of their heritage, their struggles and pain, goals, and aspirations. Each person is an individual having an experience. They each hold a depth and knowledge that I have the privilege and honor to learn from. I am so grateful to every person who shares with me. Every person's story reveals how much more I have to learn in my own journey. This is a gift, a gift of awareness.

I am outraged and angry that my black brothers and sisters cannot walk down the street without looking over their shoulder. I am enraged and sad that words of hatred are part of their daily experience. If you are confused by the uprising you are seeing in our cities and towns, imagine the confusion a small child of color feels when they experience racism in their classroom or on the playground. Educate yourself! If you are frightened by the protests that are filling our streets, imagine the fear that so many of our brothers and sisters of color experience simply going for a walk. Educate yourself! If you feel rage by the site of the destruction we are witnessing in our cities, imagine the rage created by not being heard, not being seen, and not being cared for. Educate yourself!! If you feel frustrated by what you are witnessing, imagine the frustration of not having the same opportunities as the white man or woman standing next to you. Educate yourself!

Meet your neighbor with curiosity, have an open mind for what you do not know. Ask questions and engage in dialogue. Set down your fear of what is different or unknown and reflect on the enrichment of learning about someone else’s experience as they navigate this world. Being open and acknowledging someone else’s truth does not mean you agree with everything they say or do. But, it validates what they are experiencing and keeps the dialogue going, which in turn leads to awareness, education, and enlightenment. It sheds painful and dangerous assumptions.

I may stumble on my words and things I say may be construed in a way I don’t intend, but I write from my heart and from my experiences. I ask everyone reading this to take a moment and think about how you can help your brother or sister of color. Educate yourself below the surface level and platitudes, learn and understand your own biases so as not to perpetuate or pass them on, contribute to organizations that support BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color), talk openly to your family, friends, and coworkers about race and equality, and when you see discrimination happening call it out.

I see you, I am an ally and I strive to be a light in the storm.