I am NOT Less Than a Man

I have been thinking lately about how what we assume will happen in an encounter sometimes makes it so, and how to take responsibility for that.

We live in a world today where there is a lot of hate and discrimination; for our gender, our color, our sexual orientation, etc. This Shit is REAL! It happens! I have seen it, I have experienced it, I think it is wrong, and I do not like it!

But Sometimes…

I hear stories all the time about how someone was discriminated against. I mean just go on yelp and read reviews, there is always some review saying that someone was being racist. In some of these encounters this may have been the case. One comes to mind where someone said a coworker of mine was racist because they bought a drink for each of the people next to him upon closing out, but not him. This person ASSUMED that the bartender was racist because he did not get a free drink. 

Sometimes people walk into a situation ASSUMING that they will be discriminated against. Often this will create an unconscious wall around them, and make them more difficult to connect with, and when connection does not happen in the way they want it they assume it was because they were being discriminated against. 

Often the assumption that we will be discriminated against comes from our childhood, the experiences and what is said in our household, and the world around us. It becomes hardwired into our brains, and we spend our life gathering evidence to make it true. Like the man in the yelp review. 

I am very fortunate that my mother “hardwired” into my brain that I am not less than a man, and because it was mostly us there was not a lot of “other” influence around that subject. I believe this has allowed me to see with more accuracy when I am discriminated against. I move through life believing that I will NOT be discriminated against, and it does happen, but not at every turn. I am not looking for evidence to support a story or belief that I formed in my youth. 

In this video I speak a little further about my experiences on this subject.