Dreams

In one of Keane’s songs, they say “Everybody’s changing and I don’t feel the same”. Obviously, in my line of work change is a big deal and something we strive to accomplish. One of the hardest parts of the work we do to change ourselves is the fact that we cannot change other people, which often leaves us feeling powerless and at times maybe even a little helpless. I always say that we have to focus on micro changes, rather than worrying about the macro, because very few of us have the reach or power to be able to genuinely make changes at a macro level. That is a hard thing to accept because we want others to move the way we do, we want them to see the things we see, and we believe that if everyone saw things the way we do, the world would be a better place. On today especially, I think it is important to focus on the fact that even when we see and make a change that stands up to the discerning gaze of time, that not everyone will buy in and believe the same way we do. We look today at a man who was imperfect in many ways but had such a vision for our world and our nation that people flocked to him and his cause, for good and for ill. People echo much of the things he says, but the hatred he faced lead to threats to his life and subsequently an assassination attempt which sadly was successful. Today, we mark the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr who made one of the most famous speeches in the history of our country on August 28, 1963.

Dr. King spoke in his “I Have a Dream” speech highlighting the failings of our country and the way democracy treated people. He spoke about the lack of opportunity given to black people and how they were considered “free” at that point, but how they were held back by policies, both written and unwritten. He dreamed of a future in this speech where here in Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners would be able to sit down at the table of brotherhood. In some ways that may be happening, but we are not fully recognizing his dream and vision for the future. We maintain some of the unwritten policies to this day that hold us back from the vision he held. While we elected our first ever black president in 2008, the response to that election has been an increase in racist rhetoric and the election, and eventual reelection, of a man who espouses views which resonate deeply, and are echoed by hate organizations and white supremacists. We could say this is a two steps forward, one step backwards situation, but I do not for a moment believe that to be true.

My own relationship with faith, politics, and race is complicated. I am a white man who has grown up and spent the majority of his life in the South, Georgia to be specific. I grew up going to church where I built the belief that we all were essentially good at heart, and that if we did good, we would be rewarded for it. I grew up in a part of the metro Atlanta area where I would eventually become the minority, at one point being the only white kid in my class. I was young enough that I just sort of assumed this was how the world was, sometimes you were around a lot of people who looked like you, and sometimes you were not. It wasn’t until I heard fear from my parents as they talked about the environment we were in, with our neighbor’s house being broken into, and the daughter who was not much older than me being raped there, along with my best friend’s house being broken into repeatedly that I felt there was something wrong with where we lived. I had no problem getting along with the kids at my school, although the nickname “Snow White” for being the only white kid was not high on my list of positives, but it never felt like an attack, just a silly reference to me being white. Eventually, we moved to another suburb where it had the level of whiteness of a mayonnaise factory in a snowstorm. I went from a place where the conversations were about hip-hop and sneakers, to a place where they talked about hunting and dip.

I had always felt like a bit of an outsider, I was a southern kid who loved hockey, but I had always found people I liked and could hang out with. While I was never part of the “in-crowd” I never felt completely detached from it either. This was the way life had gone and continued to go through high school. I found my people, but I also could get along with most anybody and everybody. I don’t know if it was the fact I had a diverse group of interests and could talk about a wide array of things or part of the personality I was born and raised with that made me become a therapist, but connecting with people on some level was never hard. Yet, there was an element for me where I was not comfortable with vulnerability, it felt dangerous with some people. I could only feel so comfortable and felt like people knowing all of me would push them away. Jason Isbell sings about being “raised to be a strong and silent southern man” and that resonated with me the very first time I heard it. I do not have a significantly noticeable accent, yet have had people mock it at times with certain words, and there is an overall general perception that people from the south are inherently less intelligent and more likely ignorant and racist. So many preconceived notions about who I am and what I represent have followed me for much of my life, which I can say from a position of privilege. But I believe that understanding and acknowledgment of my privilege is partly what allows me to connect and empathize more with other people. While I will never face the same experiences that a black man does, I can see how much heavier the burdens are for them than for me.

Because of the way I present to the world, and because of my position in it, I feel there is a sense of duty to speak to the world from my privilege and hope that maybe my words and actions have the micro impact on someone. I wish that upon reading “We Were Eight Years in Power” by Coates following the most recent election did not resonate the way it did. Seeing the tightrope our first black president had to walk and seeing the way the country has responded to that just confirms exactly how far away we remain from the world Dr. King envisioned we remain. Like Dr. King, I too continue to hope. I will endeavor to raise my kids to see the world in a way that hopefully continues to move us closer to that, and I will continue to try to make an impact, no matter how small it is in this world. Over the next few years, we may face some significant challenges to moving in a positive direction, but I must believe that we will continue to move in the right direction, even if far too slowly. There is a lot of good in this world, but a lot of it is scared or tired of fighting. I will close by speaking specifically to the last lines of his speech, where Dr. King dreamt of a world where we are all connected and accepting of each other, and challenge you, that if you are seeking a stance that is divisive, that you ask who or what that is serving, because I would argue Jesus and Dr. King are aligned on this.

“And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, Black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: Free at last. Free at last. Thank God almighty, we are free at last.”