Progress is bigger and more part 2
As I thought about the progress is bigger and more characteristic, my mind kept drifting to the following aspects of the characteristics and the impact it has had on my life.
- gives no value, not even negative value, to its cost; for example, increased accountability to funders as the budget grows in ways that leave those served exploited, excluded, or underserved as we focus on how many we are serving instead of quality of service or values created by the ways in which we serve
- little or no ability to consider the cost of growth in social, emotional, psychic, embodied, spiritual, and financial realms
As I thought about these characteristics, I also thought about the quote from Resmaa Menakem, “Trauma decontextualized in a person looks like personality. Trauma decontextualized in a family looks like family traits. Trauma in a people looks like culture.” It occurred to me that this constant drive for more has always felt like a drain on me. The drive for more has always come with expectations of perfection. As a Black man this has also meant that my margin for error gets smaller and more when the expectation is bigger and more. In one job I performed all of the tasks asked of me and accomplished things faster than they had been done before, but that didn’t end with any rewards like a promotion. I was met with “why didn’t I do X more” or was told “just because I did everything didn’t mean I was ready for the full-time job.”
From that point on, I’ve constantly questioned the worth of the expectation of bigger and more when this standard impacts me different. As I was told when I was young, I need to work twice as shard for half the respect. There have been many times, besides the one mentioned above, that I’ve seen others do less then me and get praised while I received criticism. As Mary Frances-Winters said
“These experiences can lead to internalized oppression, which is when we believe the negative stereotypes about our group that have been perpetuated by the dominant group. I think internalized oppression is more common than we know because there is little research on its widespread impact on feelings of self-doubt, its erosion of self-esteem and self-worth, and its generation of helplessness and hopelessness. Internalized oppression generated by systemic racism can lead to a feeling of needing constantly to be on guard and increase stress levels.”
― Mary-Frances Winters, Black Fatigue: How Racism Erodes the Mind, Body, and Spirit
With this characteristic it feels like I’m fighting the unrealistic expectations of more and perfection, while dealing with my own internal battle of the historical outcome of this stress on people like me that has not been resolved and often ignored or devalued. All of it leaves me feeling tired, stressed, and frustrated that as often as I’ve explained this impact, I’m doubted and questioned about my lived experience. Why is it so hard to believe? Even at the beginning of the formation of this country it was done so at the expense of people of color, whether it was Indigenous, Black, Brown, or Asian people that were raped, beaten, denigrated, and considered savages and property. Is it really hard to believe that the structures and culture that grew from that trauma is maintained today? When have we stopped the pursuit of more long enough to realize that the cost of humanity to everyone has been great?
I don’t know about you, but I don’t think we’ve ever weighed the ongoing costs to not understand the legacy of trauma. If you want to understand this trauma and the stress, check out these slides.
