Who Am I:  The Importance of Understanding Your Racial Identity

Who am I?  What a loaded question.  How do you begin to make sense of such a broad and all-consuming notion.  Some would look at who they are now, who they knew themselves to be, or even who the aim to be in the future, in order to answer this question.  Today we are going to focus in on understanding who we are as cultural beings.  I want to challenge you to look at not just who you are, within your own personal context, but to examine who you are as it relates to the systems and environment that you live and work in daily.

The United States is a racialized society.  Whether we like it or not, we cannot divorce ourselves from the realities of race and racism and how they impact how we see ourselves and others.  As an African-American psychologist, I have had to go through my own journey of self-discovery, as I have encountered racism and prejudice throughout my life.  Growing up in small town America, it was easy to comfortably rest in the first stage of racial identity development and believe that race was not a factor and that if I worked hard, everything would work out just fine.  As the ugliness of racism began to touch my life, I found myself working through each of the stages of Cross’ Model (Pre-Encounter, Encounter, Immersion/Emersion, Internalization, and Internalization/Commitment), dwelling longer in some stages than others. And learning that life and living are not as linear as I would prefer, often times revisiting stages that I thought I had completed.  Through this process I was forced to examine meaningful relationships, how I saw and interacted with my majority culture counterparts, how I saw myself in relation to them, and whether or not I could hold space for us both in a healthy manner.  It was difficult.  Relying on keeping a “safe” distance often times felt like the path of least resistance, yet presented as nearly impossible since I lived, worked and attended university in majority Caucasian communities.  I could not pull back and shrink.  I was forced to do the work to grow and come to terms with who I was as a racial being and how I saw others as racial beings.

Why Is this Important? Coming to understand who you are as a racial being can help you to navigate life and increase empathy for those around you.  As a psychologist empathy is the language of connection, in my daily life.  Being able to meet and care for people where they are versus where I would prefer for them to be pushes me to seek humanity in all that I encounter, despite racial and cultural differences.  I have the pleasure of helping people from all backgrounds go on their own journeys of self-discovery in a safe environment that invites them to be their full self, racialized and otherwise.  

We are all on a journey. If you are working with individuals who do not look like you are share your world view, considering how your race impacts them and vice versa may be the grist for the mill of deeper understanding and connection.  You are empowered to honor yourself where you are and honor them where they are.  We are in this together.