InDePEDENCE AND INTER-Dependence
This month began with the highlight of The Grand Old 4th of July and I am spending some time reflecting on what independence and interdependence mean to me, and what they possibly mean to other Americans.
I don’t know about you, but I grew up with the value of independence all around me; in my family, in my local community, and in our society in the US at large. As an American, it wasn’t much questioned. To be independent meant to have choice, to have power, to be free. In my earlier childhood memory, I was taught that surviving on my own was the goal and that competing to win was how we proved our superiority in a belief system that says, “the strongest will survive.” Looking back, this was an uncomfortable way to live for me. I often felt very alone and scared. It was not until my senior year in high school when, luckily, due to my privilege of growing up in a small town that valued education, I was honored to take my first civics class from a newly hired, radical, young, female teacher who taught us about the roots of democracy, critical thinking skills and how we live with a balance of both individualism and community, that I began to know better.
And, as Maya Angelou says, when we know better, we do better.
Again, due to the privilege of being encouraged to go to college and having some help to pay for it, in the mid 90’s, I furthered my interests to study the sciences and social sciences: environmentalism, astronomy, biology, geology, women studies, political science, government, and the law. I learned about the intersectionality of race, class, gender, and nature (that was a title of one of my upper division classes) in the history and hierarchical structure of power in our country and in the world. I also learned about how ecosystems function, how diversity and interdependence in nature, including humans as part of nature, are the very elements that create more opportunity not only for surviving, but for thriving. This made more sense to me inside. It was a truth that found it’s voice in myself, in my classmates and teachers then, and with friends, family, community and colleagues ever since. “Never lose your idealism” was my college graduation mantra!
What am I trying to say here? I want to point out that first of all, it is in great part because of my status as a middle class, white, able-bodied, cisgendered, college educated person, that I have learned what I have in my life. Our country’s racist and sexist history means that we are born into our lives with certain paths structured and carved already for us and it takes consciousness to change the course of the direction we are headed in. Consciousness is also a privilege in many ways, which is a form of freedom, as it is born from freedom. I believe the capacity for consciousness is inherent in all of us, but it can be frightened out of us by violence, oppression and an over focus on valuing independence, competition and dominance over interdependence, collaboration and cooperation. None of us can survive alone. We are interdependent with each other and with consciousness, we can use our freedom to choose how we want to organize ourselves.
What would happen if we thought of true freedom as INTERDEPENDENT, rather than to be won from INDEPENDENCE? What if we believed that if one of us is not free, then none of us are free? Have you considered this before? How would your life change if you did see yourself in relation to others and as invaluable as part of the whole of us all?
This is the kind of mindset shifting we can work on together in coaching. Many of my clients go through a process of clarifying their own values by looking at cultural values and what they were taught at home, in school, in church, in their communities, by our government and business leaders with critical thinking skills. Sometimes they discover that their inner critic voice is not actually theirs and that once they identify what their true voice is, they begin to use it, internally and externally, to live in alignment with their hearts, their bodies, their minds, and their spirits. My clients claim and name their own values and feel better, feel empowered and feel ready to give themselves love and respect to move in the direction that is right for them and for us all.
Are you ready? I am! Come see me. Let’s inter-connect and thrive together!
With Love,
Erin
