To be free is to be able to make choices. It is not to be told what to do or not to do. It is more than that. It is the ability to choose how you want your life to go and then do that. Liberation is about choice. It's about the freedom to act according to your own will and desires without being held back by the limitations of others or the rules of society.
In this episode, Dr. Norissa and Dr, Bukky, the podcast hosts, discuss in detail Dr. Norissa’s journey to liberation, how Dr. Norissa maintained her deGEMMification, and the emotions that accompanied Dr. Norris’s liberation journey. Dr. Norissa also easily breaks it down for us on using guilt to orient towards healing, how to handle shame, and the power of collective voice through liberation.
Timestamps
[00:46] Dr. Norissa’s journey to liberation
[06:38] How Dr. Norissa maintained her deGEMMification
[08:55] Emotions that accompanied Dr. Norissa’s liberation journey
[15:12] Using guilt to orient toward healing
[18:47] How to handle shame
[23:33] The power of collective voice through liberation
Notable Quotes
(03:03) “Each of our liberation journey will involve some sort of encounter experience where we are really evaluating and thinking in new and different ways about the liberation process.”
(04:37) “Liberation involves independent work as well as community work.”
(09:40) “Liberation is not a linear process, it’s more of a circular process where events come again and again with more richness each time.”
(13:43) “All the different emotions that we experience have a real place why they are in us.”
(15:43) “Shame deals with your evaluation and your estimation of self.”
(19:04) “Shame is not a transformative teacher.”
Relevant Links
Radical Remembering Podcast
Website: https://radicalremembering.com/
Connect with Dr. Norissa
Connect with Dr. Bukky
Want to learn more about the radical liberation, healing, and transformation process? Listen to Radical Remembering Podcast for more. We hope you have a better understanding of what the liberation process can do for you and that you feel inspired to start your own process. Subscribe to our podcast at your favorite podcast platform. Thank you for listening to the Radical Remembering podcast! Don’t miss out on our next podcast; tell a friend about us.
Transcript
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 00:01
Welcome to Radical Remembering with psychologist
Dr. Norissa Williams: 00:05
Dr. Norissa
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 00:05
And Dr. Bukky
Dr. Norissa Williams: 00:06
This is a weekly conversation where we explore the ways we've internalized oppression and consider what it really means to be liberated.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 00:12
Each episode will leave you with intimate knowledge of the liberation process, sprinkle a little healing magic, and leave you with wisdom for your journey. What's going on you all, welcome back. We're excited to be here with you all. So, today's topic that we're going to get into is exploring each of our personal processes of liberation and degemification. So, in essence, what has your personal process of liberation or degemification been like? So, Norissa, I think you should start talking about your story. What do you think?
Dr. Norissa Williams: 00:46
Yeah, definitely. So we started to talk about it in the last podcast, I would say that it's not a linear process, calling that to our attention, because in Eurocentric teaching models, we’re taught to think stage processes like it's this and it's that then there's the other and then it happens linear. But I would say that, even though some of it might be linear, that it is a circular kind of process, that we come back to some lessons to be able to live and to master it, because I can say that over the last couple of years, that's what it looked like for me. But there have been very pivotal points for me. So for example, I started to tell the story in one of our last episodes, where I was in the staff meeting, and then I began to tell them, I had left one school, and I was teaching now at NYU, and it was after five years, and I'm telling them, I came basically thinking that I can learn and grow and all those things from being in their presence, because most of them are like celebrity psychologists, really known in the field and well respected. And so, what I found then is that I was completely invisible to them, I could be in the elevator and say hi to them, even there were times when I was the only person in the elevator, so you didn't hear me say hi? And there was still no response and different things like that. So, I told them that, this is right after George Floyd when our chair was attempting to lead us into a discussion in thinking about, how does race play out here? We're thinking about how to better stuff for our students, but how does it work out among faculty? And so, after that summer, after that conversation, and that being really liberating, because it was involved activating voice, and part of liberation is activating your voice, right? And so, coming back to this space of feeling your own agency through that action. And so that whole time, I really began to think in a new and different way about my worth, and my worth within that system. And so, I changed from thinking, I'm so blessed to be in their presence, No, you're so blessed to be in my presence. Do you know who I am? And so that was the beginning of another phase of my liberation journey. But I think that each of our liberation journeys will involve some sort of encounter experience, where we are really evaluating and thinking in new and different ways about those processes. And so, it has also then been, after I had becoming that much more intentional, and that is around the time that I really began thinking and using, like, every day in conversation with other faculty of color, women of color that I was close with, like, are you practicing your liberation? This is an opportunity to practice your liberation. Oh, not today. Old Norissa, yeah, to this Norissa, no. And so, every day, I was critically thinking about whether or not I was being complicit in my own oppression. So, they didn't have to do it, because I was doing it for them. I was shutting myself up, I was bowing out of the conversation or just tired, and rightfully so, because racial trauma is real. But really thinking critically about how I was going to interrupt and dismantle harmful dynamics to myself and other people like me, whether they were black or a woman of color and different things like that. And so, I don't think it's a process that ends, because we've been socialized. For me, it was for decades socialized and so enculturated within a white supremacist frame that every day it's about looking at and learning, what have I internalized? What do I need to heal? Because healing is a part of it. And what do I need to do different action wise? And I would also add that similar to what I said the last time, that it's going to involve independent work as well as it's going to involve community work. So that for me has been about journaling about some of these issues. And so, I also have to think about my family of origin issues as well as institutional issues because they're not indivisible. Some of the ways that I've been parented has been through being within an oppressive society, and then enacting those things thinking that it's culture or all those kinds of things, when really it is the long arm of white supremacy in our family context. So, really been journaling about those and engaging in healing processes, as well as developing my own spiritual practices around ancestral veneration, and coming to know my own self, my history, my culture, in those new and different ways, and then coming into community with other people. And so, when I say community, I don't necessarily mean that it has to be like an organized religion or an organized group, I'm speaking of likeminded people who can feed each other, and so we can grow in those ways. What about you?
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 05:43
Well, before we get to me, I mean, when I think about the degemification process, I always talk about the first phase of it, including these four specific steps. One is being willing to recognize or identify that you’re a gem, or that you've been socialized into the system, that you've been impacted. So, I think this piece around seeing yourself and seeing the ways in which you've been impacted feels like number 1. Then the second piece is understanding the why? What drives and maintains your gemification? And I don't know if it's critical, but one of the things I was curious about when I heard you tell your story is saying, when you think about your, how come, how come I was in fact operating in this way? Living in my own self, silencing my own voice. What was driving that for you? How would you
Dr. Norissa Williams: 06:40
Survival. I think it was a survival mechanism, both survival and conditioning. So, I had been in context influenced by white supremacy, or steeped in white supremacy all of my life, K through 12 education, and I spent a lot K through 12, and I got an undergraduate degree, then I got a two years master's degree, and I got a six year doctoral degree. Much of my life has been defined by academia and those concepts in the culture within academia. And so, I had learned that this is the way to be, you know, production, bigger is better, and more and all those kinds of things, I had begun to breathe and live and really internalize and define myself against those standards and think it's what I should aspire to. And so, learning was part of it, but also survival. Because I've been told in so many ways, once you come in this context, leave your black self at the door in order to be able to navigate these spaces, because you'll be punished if you're not speaking how we speak, researching what we say to research, all those kinds of things. So, it was both that that was the metric that I had learned to measure myself against, and it had been punished when I was being more authentically muted. I could give so many stories about how there have been penalization for me being myself.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 08:06
Yep, yep. So really, it’s about this piece around protection and the path to success. And Norissa, one of the things I talk about is like, this piece around people needing to make space for all the different feelings that will come up in the journey, the pieces around like, and I have the specific three that I really mean, like shame, guilt, and grief. When you look at your journey, do those 3 feel resonant? Or will you describe that they're different? When you were in that encounter stage, what are the emotions that you think kind of accompanied and you experienced in your own journey?
Dr. Norissa Williams: 08:56
For me, those emotions are more in the second phase, because in counter, when your eyes are open and different things like that, I'm more enraged, like oh my god all this time. And probably even more extreme in my thinking. I mean, I was never one of these people who are like kill whitey, it’s not consistent with my nature, but just more like really dismissive of anything Eurocentric, like what you got to tell me? Like those kinds of things. And so, it was more in the second part when I was really doing the unlearning. And like I said, it's hard for me to think because it's not been a linear process, it's been something that in my own personal development that I've come back to again and again and again, and with more richness each time. And so, the grief is of the three emotions that you named stands out to me the most because there's a grief. And I think back to this, so I did this course, it's an 11 week course that I did in the work that I do. And so, it was the fourth week and I had asked the participants, this is just like two months ago, I had asked the participants, what are you thinking? What are you feeling? How are you? And this older man had said, I don't think I can make it all the way through this. And I was like, why? And he was like, I can't unsee now, and I'm just angry. And I don't trust anybody now. I'm working in a system with a lot of white folks. And I'm looking at everybody suspect now. Like you say, but are you really? And I think that that's a real natural part of the process, but that's also a grieving of what I once thought that there was, the hope that I had in the people that I'm surrounded with, the systems that I'm embedded with. And also, it was a sadness, like, wow, because he had to be in his late 50s, early 60s. And so, I've been moving through this world, everything was everything, and everything has not been everything. And so, there was a grief. And also, this renegotiation of, who can I trust? Who are really my people? And I can definitely relate to that, because there was a whole new, especially during that time, 2020 that summer, when I was really looking at like, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, you talk a good talk, because I was embedded in a department where people identified with being social justice oriented, and doing race equity work and Cultural Studies, and all those things like that. And yeah, and so that whole renegotiation of relationships with people and different things like that, was part of my grief process. And the other one, shame, I don't know that I felt shame. I felt maybe the guilt piece that I felt, and that was with me for the year following is that there was another black woman, professor who had left the year or two before me, and I saw what was going on, and I saw the racialized dynamics. And I saw that she was enacting the role of nanny, which was the role that I then began to enact to where I was doing all the nurturing, I was doing for all the students and doing all the taking care of at my own expense. And it was a role in the system so that everybody else could be free. I mean, just like slavery, right? And so, I felt a sense of guilt, because I saw what she was going through, but I didn't say anything, because I was newer in the system, first and foremost, and I hadn’t activated my voice. And notice, I didn't say found because we don't find our voice. We have our voice, but it wasn't activated. And so, I felt, it wasn't like a deep sense of guilt where I was stuck in my place, but it was a sense of guilt that made me renegotiate how I'm going to move forward in the future. And I’m fortunate enough that we're still friends, I actually saw her Friday. But we've had conversations about what I should have done what I could have done. And there's so much to the stories. But I had said, when I left, if we said her name, if we explored why she left, you all wouldn't have to say my name, I wouldn't be leaving this system, you know what I mean? So, those are the ways that those words or emotions resonate with me.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 13:18
I really appreciate that. Two things I want to just highlight, I really love this way that you're talking about it as like activating, activating voice, right? I know that I describe it as like claiming voice, but I really like this piece around activating voice. So that just feels really resonant. And the second piece is, the other thing that you're highlighting, which I think sometimes people don't always hold is, my fundamental belief is like all the different emotions that we experience, they have a real place of why they are in us. And one thing I just really appreciate you naming is that especially when we feel guilt, sometimes we can get paralyzed in feelings of guilt and shame. But if we really pay attention, and especially for guilt, guilt is actually like really why, it's when we think about how the action that we’re oriented to when we feel guilt is to move, to go repair, to do something. So, I really love you just kind of highlighting that piece around, it's like not wanting to do that again, and this piece around, how am I going to, and I would say for the same with shame. I think shame is harder, because guilt sometimes it's other focused, and it is pulling us, I think sometimes it can be easier for it to mobilize us to do and to go repair to go like, how do I want to be different? Whereas in shame, it's easy to get caught in where we feel paralyzed when we feel shame. So anyway, I just wanted to highlight that piece around the place all these emotions have, but ultimately, they are in us because it's designed to move us, to orient us to do or behave a particular way. So, it takes wisdom to be able to listen to guilt and then have that orient you, such that you have been able to have these conversations with your friend now. And I imagine that's been healing for both of you.
Dr. Norissa Williams: 15:12
I think so. Two thoughts. So, thinking about these emotions, I think that they will be person dependent. And it'll be where you are in your process dependent as well. So, had I been a person whose eyes had not been open, and I was less aware of these racialized dynamics, and myself as a racialized being in these contexts as racialized, I think I may have felt more shame. Because shame is global, where guilt is situation dependent. And this is how I acted here, and I didn't like that. But shame deals with your evaluation and your estimation of self, and your worth. And so I imagine if I hadn't been on the journey, I might have been more ashamed, like, wow, I'm really, really seeing, but depending on where you are, the emotions, the experience of it, I think I might be more or less of, or maybe not experienced. So, I really liked that. And yes, I definitely think, I mean, I can imagine for her that, because what happens in these contexts too is that when people are silent, like don't come to me after. So, each and every time I've spoken up and fought, and I fought a lot that last year that I was there, and things are so much better. And I'm so happy for the people that have come after me and been able to benefit for how different things are. But each and every time I spoke up, people would privately send a message or an email, Wow, I love that you've said that. Thank you so much. Oh my God, you have so much courage. Bro say this publicly, support me publicly so I'm not looking like the crazy lady making all the noise. Yes, good, I do feel supported I'm not going to lie. It feels good to be validated in that way. But it's not going to affect social change when you do it privately. And so, with my friend who I'm thinking of, I definitely did it publicly. Because on my way out about a year ago, this time, I sent a long email, and I called her name and I said she's been here 20 years, you all know who she is? No. You all don’t say hi to her either. And all these kinds of things. But I definitely believe that it felt vindicating and validating for her, even though I know that the system has still harmed her so much without them seeking to repair or to acknowledge what they've done, I still know that there are some things that would need to be healed. But I know that having that very public support like that, I think that for any of us, it would be healing.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 17:42
Yep. No, I mean, I'm so with you around this piece around being over. I feel like we can hold empathy for folks where you are in your own journey, that the only way you know how to reach is to reach out privately. And I think the piece that I would invite people to think about is like, and I think this is a place where I think whether it's shame or guilt, because I do think that even shame can be, I really fundamentally believe that all these emotions, they have a place, they really have a place. And I think shame is intended for us where it's like a self-evaluation piece. But if you really think about what shame wants to do, is to force us to do it differently and not do that anymore. But a lot of times we get paralyzed in it because we don't have strategies or ways to know how to tend to ourselves when we feel shame, and how we are able to be looked up on or accepted when we own what it is that we feel shame about. And we can be in community to say, and you get to try again. You know what I’m saying?
Dr. Norissa Williams: 18:47
No, I do. But I'm thinking that we might be using shame different. Because I think to feel ashamed is situational, but to feel shame is more constitutional and more global about who you are. Because something that I often say is that shame is not a transformative teacher. And so, yes, I believe that some things need to be cancelled, some people need to be cancelled, but that as a teacher is not effective, because what it is, is, it keeps you stuck. And so, how are you using shame?
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 19:23
Well, I think when we get in semantics around shame versus ashamed, but the feeling of shame, whether that is a pervasive feeling that stays with one all the time, or it is a situational feeling that is experienced related to something one has done. I think the piece I'm saying is A, we need strategies to be able to take care of ourselves when we are in that place. One of the things I thought you said was really, really, really, really important is that when we don't hold context around how we've been socialized, or how powerful our socialization is or how institutions have affected us, it is easy for us to see that it's about a defectiveness within us, that is why we are playing and moving the way we are, when in reality, it's actually been because of, so I think the point you're making is saying, depending on where we are in our journey, really influences that, like, am I going to feel shame about this thing? Or is it guilt? Is it a different emotion that sort of shows up? So, I do think that context matters for sure. So yeah, I do think it matters. I think the piece that I'm ultimately trying to call out is, one of the things I think we as folks of color, black folks do is we can be dismissive about our emotional experience. And I think this piece I'm trying to kind of open up space for, for folks is saying, when you are on your liberation journey, I think there are going to be constantly different emotions that are coming up throughout the entire journey, that we need to start to build our capacity to tolerate and know what to do with. And even the most paralyzing, what did you call it Norissa? It's not transformational feeling like shame, for example, whether it's a pervasive experience of shame, or a situational feeling of shame. The thing that I believe that helps us move through shame is actually the opposite of it, a sense of acceptance. So that which goes back to this piece around community, community care, and this piece around finding your people, who can see you and hold you and support you through it. So, I think that that's the piece I think I'm just trying to name is making space for the emotional experiences that we're going to have through the journey. And then also, one of the strategies that we got to put in our pocket of how we tend to it is how we get supported with community. Like if we bring that forward, folks can hold up. Does that make sense?
Dr. Norissa Williams: 22:00
It does. It does. And it makes sense because shame is an isolating emotion. When we feel shame, what we tend to do is go high, and because you don't feel like you're worthy of the look of being held in that way. And so, it does definitely make sense.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 22:17
That's right. The other piece I want to just name out too, though, is the piece that you were saying earlier around, how critical, if in fact we want things to change, when we see someone taking a risk to show up in a more liberated way, and we can all feel inspired by it and go high five them quietly about it. But this piece around us risking on their behalf and on our behalf as well, of powering them up in the moment. Because two voices are so much better than one voice, three voices to say me too. I just think there's a way in which, one of the things, I mean, if we think about it like white supremacy culture, individualism is one of the symptoms and the ways that we're always trying to move in this world. But one of the things I think we've forgotten that is helpful for helping us get into connection with our power is really this piece around the power of collective voice, and our need to really lean into that and organize. I just feel like that's the other piece I just wanted to highlight is that piece you were saying around folks who come give you high fives on the low, but were present and didn't say anything.
Dr. Norissa Williams: 23:32
Yeah, I definitely agree with it. And I think of it collectively as much as I think of it as an individual kind of process. And so, that part is totally necessary. It's also very validating for the person who is in their process. Because if I'm going to continue the fight, for you to do so and do that with me publicly, I'm encouraged to do the fight because I feel less alone, and I feel partnered with in this journey. And that communalism, that other-centeredness is just as important, just as the strength that we lend in that is just as important as that individual process of coming to voice. And it helps the person who then supported too, so you could only take that step because the other person risked. So, it's easier for you to take that step, and then you taking that step, it’s easier for them to make that step, and so on and so forth, too. And when we think about change, a lot of times people think about organizational and systems level change as originating top down. That's not how change most effectively originates. Because 1, it’s hierarchical, and 2, they haven't accessed the voice of those within the system at all levels, and so, the change is temporary and doesn't include the voice and perspective of those lower in the hierarchy. And so, change really happens when there are small fires, little fires everywhere equals one huge big fire. So small pockets, so you and me within an institution, and small groups moving forward, and then eventually everybody has to hear. And even if it's like larger groups like 10 people gathered, and having both a top up and a bottom down, that's when institutional organizational change really happens.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 25:29
1,000% Yeah. Part of what I'm curious about is, I feel like part of, I know my story is a lot more long winded because I have own way of expressing myself. How are we doing with time in terms of like, do we have time to tell it in this episode? Or we got to save it for the next episode?
Dr. Norissa Williams: 25:45
I think we should restart in next episode, but this was a good conversation.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 25:50
Always. Always, Dr. Norissa Williams, always. Alright, so with that, thank you so much for listening to us, you all. We'll catch you on the next episode.
Dr. Norissa Williams: 25:59
Thank you. Bye, bye. Thanks for listening.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 26:03
If you love what we've had to say, please subscribe on your favorite podcast platform
Dr. Norissa Williams: 26:07
I’m Dr. Norissa, and you can find me on IG at Dr. Norissa Williams.
Dr. Bukky Kolawale: 26:11
And I'm Dr. Bukky, you can find me on IG at the official Dr. Bukky.
Dr. Norissa Williams: 26:16
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