Building Our Areas with Native
and Indigenous People and
Global Majority People at the Center
The following is a report from a topic group for Area Reference Persons. It was held at the East Coast North America Teachers’ and Leaders’ Workshop led by Tim Jackins. The group was about building Areas with Native and Indigenous people and Global Majority (GM) people at the center. It was led by Billy Yalowitz, and E— Torres gave a talk as well.
Billy is white and Jewish and has a mixed-class background. He lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, and has been an Area Reference Person for twenty-six years.
E— is a Southern U.S. African-heritage woman who has been an Area Reference Person for thirteen years. She grew up in Mississippi, USA, and was raised poor. Her parents were sharecroppers (people who worked the land owned by white people for a portion of the yearly value of the crop).
Billy Yalowitz shared:
I think of being an Area Reference Person (ARP) as an unusual opportunity to love a group of people over a long period of time. It is an opportunity to grow with them into fuller and more effective use of the tools of Co-Counseling and to become closer and closer to them in the re-emergence and liberation process.
I think many of us who have become ARPs were the ones who provided hope for our families of origin and tried to save our families from falling apart. We were counselors for our families. We may have gained skills from doing that that are useful in the ARP role. However, we need to have people in close and keep discharging to separate the ARP job from our chronic distress. We can keep showing ourselves and not try to operate on top of old distresses about ensuring our families’ survival.
BEING PARTNERS WITH OTHER LEADERS
As ARPs we pour our time and love into something that grows slowly. (We’d make bad capitalist entrepreneurs who are intent on quick growth and conquest of “new markets” of people.) We build our Areas despite capitalism. We need partnerships with other RC leaders to do this work. We can deepen our relationships with our Alternate ARP and other Area leaders so that we are not alone in moving this important work forward. Our relationships with our Regional Reference Person and other ARPs in our Region are also important. And we can have ongoing contact with ARPs outside our Region.
LETTING PEOPLE LOVE US
Harvey [Jackins] used to say that letting people love us is part of being an RC leader. How do we keep letting people in close, closer than our chronic material [distress] has allowed? We each lead both as our human self and as “a person of our people”—as a female, a male, a Native and Indigenous person, a GM person, a Jewish person; as a working-class or owning-class person. How much can we show about that? I try to share the story of my people. I share my strengths and chronic patterns. I try to keep noticing that people in my Area care about me, and I try to receive that caring from them.
LEADING MY AREA
I inherited an Area that was struggling. Many people were on the edge of RC (not committed to or fully participating in it). It was okay with me that most of the folks I “inherited” dropped out over the next few years. I essentially started over. For about ten years I had seven to ten people in my Area. A lot of Areas are like that—small for a long time. That’s okay. There’s no term limit for RC leaders. It’s fine if it takes time to find ourselves in the job.
I built strong relationships with a couple of Native and Indigenous and GM folks. We now have more of these folks than white folks. We limited the number of white folks in fundamentals classes so that the classes would have a strong majority of Native and Indigenous people and GM people. These newer folks are reaching out to the people in their lives and communities. We have had to keep developing enough leaders to have classes for the Native and Indigenous and GM people who are interested in learning fundamentals.
ELIMINATING WHITE RACISM
Eliminating white racism (EWR) has been a key ongoing Area project. Those of us who are white had families who mostly didn’t know how to build relationships with Native and Indigenous and GM people or how to support us as young people to build those relationships. It can take years to build deep relationships with Native and Indigenous and GM people and years to bring these friends into RC. We need to decide that having these relationships is to have the lives we have always wanted.
We can sometimes feel competitive about who is the “best” white person, who is the “best” ally. We need to keeping working on our goodness, which was undermined by the racism that got imposed on us from the beginning of our lives. For me, EWR work is at the core of building an Area.
NATIVE AND INDIGENOUS AND GM LEADERSHIP
I invited W.M., a working-class Black woman, to assist me in my leaders’ class. She did that for eight years. I checked all my thinking with her as I led and kept learning from her. I decided that if the class was working for her, it would necessarily work for everyone else, and that happened. She is now a strong leader and is ready to become an ARP. For me it is sweet and fulfilling to support someone as they learn how to lead in Co-Counseling. AW, a Japanese American woman and RC family work leader, is the Alternate ARP of the Area. I work closely with her and learn a lot. She has brought a strong new group of RCers into the Area and is an excellent leader, already referencing in the Area and Region.
I consider the relationship between a teacher and their assistant to be of key importance. I counsel teachers and assistants in front of my Area leaders’ class—on how much they like each other, on their embarrassment, on the next steps in their relationship. Often they are two Native and Indigenous or GM people, and I learn from them about closeness. White leaders work regularly on their relationships with Native and Indigenous or GM teaching partners. It’s important not to leave people alone in those relationships. Fundamentals and ongoing classes in the Area go as well as those relationships are going.
BEING ALLIES
Ally-ship is not a one-way relationship. We white people can show ourselves to the folks we are allies to. As a Jew I work on my internalized oppression. I invite people to be my ally while I learn to be theirs. It’s been important for me to have real relationships.
Dvora Slavin, who leads many RC EWR workshops, has encouraged us to learn about our lineage as part of EWR work. If our people have been considered white longer than a generation or two, we have more digging to do. What happened in Europe to our people? This information can help us discharge about our family and on our early material with more perspective. We can gradually invite Native and Indigenous and GM people to know the story of our people and our family. It must be a two-way relationship, and it requires EWR work every step of the way.
We now more often work on racism in mixed groups as more Native and Indigenous people and GM people come into the Area. It’s “messier,” but it is useful to do it together. We do this in addition to working separately as Native and Indigenous and GM people and as white people.
E— Torres shared:
I’m the Area Reference Person for an RC Community in western Massachusetts, USA. The Area is mostly Native and Indigenous people and GM people. We are Native American, African heritage, Puerto Rican, Asian, and of others backgrounds.
We started out with three people. We had meetings with our allies and discharged on “What would it mean to build an Area for Native and Indigenous people and GM people?” We had fundamentals classes for Native and Indigenous and GM people. White people recruited people for these classes. Sometimes they even drove people to class and arranged babysitting for parents who needed it. Finally enough Native and Indigenous and GM people were in classes on a regular basis that we started a support group for them so they could connect and discharge together.
As ARP I counseled on getting close to people. I had huge sessions on how different and scary it was for me to be a leader and connected to people—because of my early distresses and growing up in the segregated U.S. South. I discharged on this with the allies in the Region.
I counseled for months on being in charge, being totally connected to people, and being my full self. And I encourage people in my Region and Area to discharge on being connected to each other and being themselves.
I’m also the ARP for all Native and Indigenous and GM people in the Region. They all know each other and are connected to each other. They have sessions across Areas. Native and Indigenous and GM people are central to our Region. We have a leaders’ team of nine people—five are Native and Indigenous or GM people, and four are white. We have a monthly leaders’ class and a monthly support group for Native and Indigenous and GM people. I also lead a weekly class for African-heritage people. Some of us are teaching classes, and others are assisting in or leading support groups. My Alternate ARP organizes and leads a quarterly support group for me.
One of the things we’ve done is to have a white person recruit a class of Native and Indigenous and GM people and have a Native and Indigenous or GM person assist until they feel comfortable enough to lead the class.
We try doing things that are “outside the box.” We try to remember that we can call for a session from almost any Native and Indigenous person, GM person, or ally across the Region. There is attention put on not doing things alone, on always having an assistant or a buddy to do things with.
Almost every event starts with mini-session on racism and on following the leadership of Native people. We include discharging on the effects of the climate emergency and its connection to racism and how racism has kept us separated from each other.
My Alternate ARP is a Native American woman. We stay close with each other. We think together about the folks in our Area and make sure they are connected, getting regular sessions, and regularly attending classes. We have constituency groups for the Native and Indigenous and GM people. We work on racism, early sexual memories, sexism, classism, the climate crisis, and following Native American leaders. We have a yearly daylong workshop for our Area. We also invite other leaders to lead workshops for our Area. Since we are mostly Native and Indigenous and GM people, we have workshops on cross-cultural racism for our Area and for the ARPs in our Region.
If you are an ARP and are thinking about working to incorporate Native and Indigenous people and GM people into your Community, building relationships is the most important thing. Discharge your distresses about Native and Indigenous and GM people and white people being together and about bringing them together and counseling them on having each other and showing themselves and where they struggle.
Everybody needs to tell their story. They need to be “in there” with each other no matter what [under all conditions]. As an ARP you need to discharge about trusting their thinking and following their lead. You need to discharge about your experiences with racism. What gets in the way of your being completely connected to Native and Indigenous people and GM people? Remember that racism affects us all. We all have early hurts about it and about people who are different from us.
Reprinted from the e-mail discussion
list for RC Community members