Ep 26: Getting Unstuck when Fear Has You Frozen

Sometimes people, especially white folks, choose not to engage with racial justice work, for fear of making a mistake. April and Tracie dig in to those fears, what's behind them, how they show up, and some strategies for addressing them so that you can keep going.

Access a free discussion guide for this episode here: http://bit.ly/2MTR3ec

Find April and Tracie's full bios and submit topic suggestions for the show at www.JewsTalkRacialJustice.com

Learn more about Joyous Justice where April is the founding and fabulous (!) director and Tracie is a senior partner: https://joyousjustice.com/
Read more of Tracie's thoughts at bmoreincremental.com

Resources and notes:

Read more from adrienne maree brown
See some of Cesar Millan (the dog whisperer)'s techniques on his YouTube channel

April N. Baskin's KAVOD Conflict Navigation Model 

• K - Keep calm
• A - Acknowledge how you're feeling and the situation
• V - Validate the other person's feelings
• O - Offer next steps (this can be "I need time to process, may I circle back with you next week")
• D - Debrief and Do: talk about it with a trusted confidante and follow through on what you said you'd do. 

©2021 April N. Baskin, Joyous Justice. All rights reserved.

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- [Tracie] Some people, especially white folks, approach racial justice work with a posture of fear. They're afraid they're gonna make a mistake, screw it up somehow. Sometimes, that leads to them not engaging at all. Today, we address those fears directly.- [April] This is "Jews Talk Racial Justice" with April and Tracie.- [Tracie] A weekly show hosted by April Baskin and Tracie Guy-Decker.- [April] In a complex world, change takes courage.- Whole-hearted relationships can keep us accountable. April, it's great to see you again. I love our weekly calls.- Me too. (laughs) I truly cherish them.- So today, I thought we could talk about this sentiment that I often hear, and I'm sure, we've talked about it before, so I know you hear it, too, of, especially white folks, who are paralyzed by the fear of making a mistake in racial justice work. They're just so scared they're gonna make a mistake, or mess up that they just are afraid to engage at all.- Freeze.- Yeah, yeah. It causes a form of paralysis.- Or feel stuck, or feel stuck. Well, I'm specifically trying to avoid potentially ableist language, which is why I'm saying freeze. (laughs)- Right, right, I said paralyzed. Thank you for naming that, yeah. That need to look for new language.- Well, it such a great metaphor, but I think, and I haven't explicitly heard that that's ableist, but I have feeling-- It sounds, no-- That it might be.- Once you pointed it out, I think, for sure, someone who's dealing with some sort of neurological disorder that yeah, yeah. Sorry for not seeing that earlier.- Me too, well, 'cause yeah, and so, right, and so, noticing where people just get stuck or frozen out of fear, and what people articulate, and I've seen this over years of doing this work, is it's a common fear that specifically white folks have with regard to racial justice work, is, I think, both fear of making a mistake and also, a fear of being called out.- Yeah, yeah, I've heard it described as walking on eggshells.- A fear of being called out a fear of... Them hurting someone and also, having negative repercussions for the program they're leading or for their-- For their own ego.- Career and fearing that they may take a course of action in an effort to advance racial justice, and then, it may undermine racial justice. And there's just a lot to unpack here that we may or may not cover in this-- Right.- Session. So where do you think it would be good to start, my more linear partner?- Yeah, well, I wanna, so I wanna start, if I may, with my sort of personal experience.- Excellent, love it.- With this fear and how I have dealt with it, and then, maybe we can go into other strategies and also kind of what's behind some of the thinking. So early in my journey, when I would have those kinds of, ugh, I can't, I don't wanna do this, I'm afraid I'm gonna make a mistake, I'm afraid I'm gonna screw it up, that's the way I would think about it. And then, one day, I kinda realized that actually, I'd already screwed it up. I mean, that's why I had to be awakened. That's why I had to have that moment where I realized and I saw my white privilege in ways that I hadn't seen it before. That's why I needed to have that moment, because I'd been screwing up. I'd been complicit, and so, it wasn't a question of whether. I'd already done it, and so now, what was I gonna do? And for me, at least, sort of saying that out loud, and feeling, just living with that, it's counterintuitive, but I found it really freeing, because it meant that I didn't have to sort of be stuck because of a thing that might happen. It had already happened, and now I needed to move forward, and moving forward felt like the only option once I sort of acknowledged that. So I don't know if that will work for everyone's psyche, for every white anti-racist, aspiring anti-racist, but for me, at least, and I know some people I've coached through it, that is a helpful framing to remind yourself it's not a question of whether, it's a question of what are you gonna do now? Because once you frame it as that, standing still stops being an acceptable option.- So well said. As you were talking, my mind went to like 10 different things.- First thought, best thought?- I love that saying and practice. I mean, 'cause where I'm going is actually, potentially just a whole other topic, but... So I think, I'm like dissecting it. So one, I was noticing, as you were talking, that I've heard this expressed by both genders, but I hear it disproportionately expressed by women.- Interesting.- Right, so I think that is interesting to notice, and part of that, I think, is because the Jewish communal field is predominantly composed of female professionals. So that's a part of it. I think, also, women, again, speaking in generalities, or people who are raised as women, who function in the world as women, are, at times, who are, particularly those who are cisgender, are conditioned to be more expressive about what's happening in our inner world, and are conditioned, I was, at least, conditioned, to endeavor to not upset people.- Yeah.- As much as possible. So I think there's this interesting multilayered, intersectional dynamic around gender and race among other things that's playing out here. So there's just a lot of nuance here and a lot of layers, but so going back to this initial piece here, as we're flipping the script. So as you were starting to talk about, I think really strengthening our thinking and our analysis around what's happening and what different options we have about our orientation to our fear of making a mistake. So to me, it's also really important, and I think you sorta started to touch on this in some ways in your reflections, which means like a natural next step, maybe it isn't at all, but... From my vantage point, it's just, mistakes are going to be made, and even more significantly, as adrienne maree brown says, we're operating in a sea of harm, and a lot of unhealed harm. So even when we do things right, at times, people are still going to be upset, because they have unhealed trauma. Our country is laden, is just drowning in unhealed, unaddressed trauma, and it plays out in all kinds of ways. But how I would love for it not to continue to play out is stopping or impeding good people from doing courageous, trajectory-shifting work for our community around justice. In this case, specifically, racial justice, right? So I think it's important, like you did some of this work and this was reflected in the wonderful story you shared at the outset, Tracie, but I would invite any person who is feeling this way, regardless of their identity around gender or race or any other thing, right, just for everyone, because many people may feel this way about this, too. It just happens that Tracie and I have encountered a lot of white folks, and often, white women saying this. But also, I've heard white male executives, Jewish executives talk about this, and also, not Jewish, but I mostly focus on work in the Jewish community these days. So is to do some personal reflection around why you feel that way because our feelings are caused by thoughts. So what are the thoughts that you're having? And I would specifically look at that, because we named a couple of them, but as looking for you, rather than just listening to us, is assessing for yourself and being as brave and honest as you can, possibly doing the work with a partner or a friend, and exploring why, what am I afraid of? What is it you're afraid of? Are you afraid of hurting a person of color? Are you afraid of how it's going to make you look? Are you worried about the damage it may do to your career? Are you worried that you are going to be seen in some negative way, as arrogant or oppressive by someone you respect? What is the fear that you have? Or whatever other negative feeling you have, and take some time to notice that. And then, once you do that, I would encourage you to start to think about how would you want to feel? How do you wanna feel? Right, like what would you like to experience? So that's one piece, and then, the next thing I would say is that to me, obviously, so one, and it may not be obvious, that we can't get stuck here, that it's important to honor, to presence and honor and to be present with these tough feelings and figure out how to move forward anyway.- Keep going.- Because there is still racial injustice.- Right.- And this is an all hands on deck sort of issue, where we need to center the voices of the people who are most directly impacted, and it's gonna take leadership from a lot of different folks in their spheres of influence to move this forward in ways that are aligned with the leadership of people of color, and also, specifically, qualified. And what I mean by qualified is not some white supremacist delusional trait, but I mean, sort of what you would look for in a leader in any sphere. Are they leading a community of other folks? Do they have experience in this area? Because there's a persnickety issue of tokenism, this is a bit of an aside, of tokenism that plays out in our community, and I think people, at times, kind of conflate respecting a person's narrative and a person's autonomy with someone who has been doing the work, who is educated, who has a degree in this, and/or years of experience leading people of color and/or white people and people of color in the work of racial justice, who is qualified to do that.- One thing I'd love to layer on to what you said about-- I didn't finish the thought. But go ahead.- Oh, I'm sorry.- No, it's okay.- No, no.- I did one my ADHD asides.- Yup.- So I wanna hear what you have to say, but I did a little bit of an aside, but what I was trying to get back to is it's helpful to think of a holistic game plan here. So if you're working on some project and you're afraid of making a mistake, so it's beginning to thinking about, what support systems do you have in place? Do you have a mentor you can talk some of these things through? Do you have existing transformative relationships where you've really established a robust relationship, that you have some of the space to call on and check in with certain folks? So that's one variable, and then, also, what I'm trying to get to to say is that also, really having a good plan in place for how you're going to care for yourself and another person, if and when conflict arises and someone says, or points out a mistake that you made. I think that this can be a lot less scary, thanks for going on that journey with me, y'all, as I'm trying to get to this whole time, is really thinking through and beginning to practice or even role play with confidants or friends or colleagues around how you manage if and when a tense moment comes up. Because to me, at times, it's, often, at times, it's tension and emotion. It's not necessarily a mistake. I think, at times, there's work that people, I think, in general, there's work that people need to do around increasing their capacity to be present with emotion, because just because someone has big emotions doesn't necessarily mean that a mistake was made. It might but those two things aren't necessarily the same. And that, actually, a healing process can also surface upsetting emotions. And so, for me, it's also having a plan in place for how, if and when you actually do need to make an apology, what's the way that you make an apology? Is there a way that you can have a plan, for instance, around something, if something is raised for you to say, "Oh, wow, I wasn't aware of that."Thank you for bringing that to my attention."It's raising a lot of thoughts and ideas for me."Is there anything else more you want to say right now?"I'm happy to listen, and then, I think,"I need to take some time to do a bit of reflection,"and I wanna circle back to you once I've done some work"to think about what you've said." So essentially what I'm modeling here is maybe you have plan for both honoring the person and also, giving yourself some room. That just because something gets surfaced, that doesn't mean you need to fix it right then. It is important that you validate what somebody is raising, but you also may need some time to deal with the surprise, to assess, if their assessment is in alignment, if there's an area of something that you were not aware of, that now you need to take a little bit of time to reflect upon, et cetera. So you also wanted to layer in something else, Tracie.- Actually, it's better here.- Okay, great.- So my mom always, she always tells me that all fears boil down to the same fear, which is that we can't handle it. Even fear of death is fear that we can't handle it.- Mm.- And so, recognizing that, and recognizing that you can handle it, especially if you put some of the things in place that April's just been talking about, you can handle it. So the fear of the mistake is actually a fear that you can't handle the consequences of that mistake, right? And you can, you can handle it.- Yes, yes.- Especially if you do these things that April was talking about, and think about it in advance, so that you know how you will handle it.- What's your protocol?- It won't break you.- What's your F-up protocol? Or what's your conflict or cluster-F protocol? (laughs) I have several. They are very helpful. (laughs) Of what happens when this thing, you know, I often, I get really present, I really listen, I do something of possibly, either turning on a recorder or if someone is okay with that and I will talk, I will write or talk and say, here's what just happened, I need to take a break, go for a walk, not needing to fix something, take time, like there's any number of different things we can do or if it's something that needs an immediate response, and at times, part of, also, our work, as we know, especially for those of us who work in any number of fields, there's a job of both being present with what someone is saying and then, assessing, because if we just base things off of our inboxes, we would think that there were perpetually emergencies always happening. But what we know is, in fact, that certain people have urgent energy or might be upset about something that may be an urgent issue, that needs corrective right then. Usually, I think any situation of upset does need a response in the moment. Ideally, is met with responsibility and compassion, but that doesn't mean that something needs to be necessarily fixed immediately. There's a way that we can honor and say, wow, you have raised, if, depending upon the circumstance. If they say something totally, that sounds completely bogus to you, right, which may happen at times, and this is a little tricky, because I am saying this as a person of color who has taken a lot of time to learn about this. So there are certain folks who might deem something as bogus that's actually truly legitimate.- Right.- I'm not talking about that. I'm saying if someone says something that's really off-base, to me, that's often a sign that there may be some kind of trauma, past trauma for them that was triggered, and I still get really present with them, and say, "I'm really glad you brought this to me," because even if something weird is coming up, oftentimes, that person is trusting you enough to share their upset with you, and as difficult or as tense as that might be, that is often a profound opportunity for deeper relationship building. And so, (clears throat) doing what I said, and what Tracie, then, further emphasized around preparing in advance can prepare us, in these moments, because I think this is another really good point that kinda rises above some of the rest, is that people, at times, are so focused on the fear that they miss in these racial justice moments, and working across lines of difference moments, that often, those moments of tension, if they're handled well, can be the bedrock of powerfully transformative and deep and profound relationship, if you know how to navigate it well. And it's honestly not that complicated. It does take discipline and strength. I'll let y'all in on a little secret. (laughs) A couple weeks ago, a couple, about a month or so ago, my team members have been teasing me about it, Sarah, who posts our videos on our, on my YouTube page, so she can see the different videos that come up on YouTube, and there's a lot of Cesar Millan videos, the Dog Whisperer, because I think that there's a lot of insight that Cesar Millan can share for us around racial justice work or just working with people, and people who have been hurt, with traumatized people. I honestly think it's not that different than handling with other, working with other traumatized creatures is you gotta be calm and presence, present, you have to have calm and presence, and honor what's surfacing, and do enough of your own work over time that you get clear that this is a hard moment, and I'd like to avoid this type of thing in the future, but I am committed enough to this that I'm not going away. I might need to take a break, I might need a few minutes or a week to process something, but I'm clear that I'm fully committed to racial justice, and I'm appreciative, whether or not I'm clear that what they are saying is brilliant or I'm not so clear and it's potentially more, may be about their upset. They're still reaching for connection, and so I'm gonna honor that. So I hope we can start to move, and can you say that again, what you shared before, Tracie, about your mother's insight about what all fear is? Can you say that again?- Yeah, all fear is the same fear, and it's the fear that you won't be able to handle it, whatever the thing is.- Right, and here's the thing, is you can handle it.- Right.- Right? You can.- You can.- And some of you who are listening, you may know, or you may not realize yet, but you have everything you need right now, based upon your current skills from transferrable parts of your life to deal with it right now. Some of you might be aware of that, some of you may not, and you might have a little bit of impostor syndrome, but actually, you have the chops, and for those of you who don't yet, this is a completely learnable skill. How to notice how you're feeling, how to say, I have this kavod model, and I think it could even been simpler than that, this is acronym, kavod, that stood for, keep calm, acknowledge how you're feeling, acknowledge sort of what's happening, right, validate the other person. Find something validate, even if it's thank you for bringing that to my attention, I wasn't aware. Offer a solution or next steps, which could be I need time to think about what you said. I really appreciate what you're saying. Could we schedule a time in a couple days, or next week to circle back about this, once I've done a little bit of my own work to reflect upon what you've said? Is there anything, and you know, you might wanna also offer, is there anything else that I haven't, that you haven't yet voiced that you wanna make sure I hear before I take some time to do some reflection? And then, D can stand for debrief, or I forgot, there was a different D word I used, but basically, it's also around next action, is to then circle back later with that, is to then take the steps that you need to take, right?- And I just wanna name, for the folks listening who maybe don't recognize the word, that kavod means honor in Hebrew.- Thank you.- So this acronym is about really honoring that-- Everyone.- That moment.- Honoring that moment, the other person, yourself.- Yourself, mm-hmm. Yeah.- 'Cause people, because we live in this culture, we live in such an oppressive culture. To me, the reason there's so much shame in our culture, in part, is very tied to different forms of oppression that really work to shame different people. But that is a false notion and an incorrect notion, and there are ways that we can move forward work where we don't have to shame anyone. Accountability and shame are not the same things. At times, they get conflated, just like many things around love get conflated, but I think, often, they get conflated with the absence of love than what, actually, what love, or a dysfunctional dynamic that is not love, right? So there's a way to, that we can begin to have, to face tough things, to have hard conversations, and to care for the other person and ourselves. And so, I'm recommending, it may not always be the case, right, and then, even then, you might wanna take a break and say, let me, I wanna take a few minutes, or just say you need to go to the restroom or something, but give yourself some time, because often, when these things happened, we are triggered, and there is a response, we are having a physiological response that happens in less than a second. It's milliseconds, so we begin feeling the effects in our body before we're even consciously aware that it has happened, and we might need to take some time, even just having time to go to a restroom and taking 10 slow deep breaths, 10 of breathing in, holding for a moment, slowly exhaling. And you may find, by the third or fourth breath, that it's starting to calm your body and go all the way to 10, right. And then, if you need to respond in that moment, you can, but often, much of the time, we don't necessarily have to and it's good to pause and give everyone some space to decompress and to honor and say, we will, let's connect about this, let's schedule a time, do that. Don't avoid it, 'cause then that will make it much worse, but give yourself, set everyone up for success, if you can. And set everyone up to have a space to be heard and to figure out an appropriate course of action if there is a teachable moment, and learning that can be done in a way that honors all of us, because mistakes are unavoidable.- Right.- And as I often say, we are operating in a sea of harm. So even folks who are doing this perfectly are still going to have people who think a mistake is being made because it triggers an old pain for them.- Right, right, and you're not gonna do it perfectly, because we're human and we're imperfect, and that's just the nature of our existence. And I'm gonna say it again, I know I'm a broken record on this, but it's like exercise, and if you're like, I want to do this run perfectly, or I'm not gonna do it at all, how is that helping anyone, right? If you go on your first multi-mile run, and you don't wanna do it because you might have to walk, so you choose not to do it? Clearly that's not the way you get to be a better runner. And it's the same, it's the exact same with racial justice work. If you're worried you're gonna make a mistake when you have this conversation, when you run this program, when you go to this program, when you, whatever it is that you're in front of, and so, you choose not to do it, that's like not doing the run, because you're afraid you might have to walk for part of it. So.- Yeah, and so, get something like a kavod plan in place for yourself. Write it out, and so, when these fears arise, you can say to yourself something as simple as, I have a plan for if that happens, and I have this list and also, maybe make a list of mentors and/or confidants, whetter they are professional, people who share your identity, people who you work with across lines of difference, who you are in deep and meaningful relationship with. It could be a family member, it could be a parent or a sibling, and you're like, and these are the folks I can call if I end up getting a bit of mud on my face, 'cause I'm gonna get through it, and that's part of what powerful leadership and forward movement looks like. And the upside of this is as you figure out how to move forward, you'll start to see that it can actually, as I mentioned earlier, be really beautiful, and so I would encourage you to shift from focusing on the fear to focusing on what's possible and learning skills that help you make the most of those opportunities, and when that thing happens, when someone brings pain, that's an opportunity, rather than focusing, and it may take time. I'm not saying this is an overnight thing, of saying, shit, pardon my language, but like, F, shit, I messed up, I'm awful. Rather than doing that, of saying, whoa, this is a sacred opportunity right now. This person is coming to me, and even if they say they don't fully trust me, they trust me enough to actually bring it to me.- Right.- This is a sacred moment, so I'm gonna breathe, and either be willing to listen in that moment, or say, is there more, I'm wiling to listen, thank you for bringing this to my attention. Are you in a place where you're comfortable letting me know what's on your mind or would you rather I go back to the drawing board and do some reflection and come back to you? What would make the most sense? Right? The more we can move out of the shame, which, then, just has us go inward, it also has us distance ourselves from the person who's reaching for us in that moment.- Right.- Right? There's new possibilities that are available, and there are a range of different possibilities that are available for each of us, and we get to get better and work on continuing to strengthen our capacity to support each other as we take on courageous action with humility and an open heart, and increasing rigor around the strength of our anti-racism. Thanks for tuning in. Our show's theme music was composed by Elliott Hammer. You can find this track and other beats on Instagram @ElliottHammer. If this episode resonated with you, please share it and subscribe. To join the conversation, visit jewstalkracialjustice.com, where you can send us a question or a suggestion, access our show notes, and learn more about our team. Take care until next time, and stay humble and keep going.