Knowing Versus Feeling - Such a Profound Difference!

We had a national speaker, Jodi Pfarr, come do training for our staff on Living in a Diverse World.  I had heard some of it at a conference but the whole training was incredibly impactful. 

We took some time to really look at dominant cultures, where we each fit, and how we tend to normalize that context.  But the way she did it was so concrete and tangible.  We had a diagram of 12 pairs of triangles (one of each pairs was right side up and blue while the other was upside down and red).  We identified 12 situations where policy or systems were geared toward the dominant culture (like being right handed versus left handed, middle class versus poverty, etc…).  When we were done identifying the 12 situations, we each circled, on our own papers, where we were part of the dominant culture and where we were not.  It helped us have a context for our discussions for the rest of the day. 

It was a great day and a number of staff told me it was the best training they ever attended.  They want to put red and blue triangles on their computers to remind them that others may see things from a different perspective and that it is a valid perspective. 

I was talking to Jodi afterwards and she said something that was so profound to me.  She said when you are part of the dominant culture you get it academically, you can know it – but when you are part of the non-dominant culture you feel it because you are experiencing it.  This is not new information and really it’s pretty obvious – experience speaks louder in our heads and hearts than knowledge, but hearing it in this context, around cultural norms, really made me think.   

Someone I care deeply about was dealing with mental health issues.  They were feeling particularly vulnerable and couldn’t reach a family member so they called crisis – exactly as they were supposed to do.  Four state police cars showed up at their house and took them in handcuffs to the hospital even though they were not at all violent and were going completely voluntarily – it is standard protocol.  I met them there and we were taken to an empty room – just a mattress on the floor.  I sat, in my dress, on the floor beside them – not wanting them to feel like everyone who was interacting with them was looking down on them.  I serve on a health systems board so I know those processes exist to keep staff and the individual safe.  But I cannot put into words what experiencing it felt like.  And as much as I felt it, I can’t even imagine how difficult it was for the individual I was with.  Voiceless.  Vulnerable.  Feeling the full weight of the experience.    

We can know about the complexities, the difficulties that come from feeling like you have little or no voice, but that is far different than feeling voiceless.  Obvious, I know – but so many truths are that way, simple and overlooked.  As Marcel Proust said “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes”.