We live in a world where our experiences of individual and group differences are more expansive every day. As globalism, transportation, and communication make our world smaller, we gain contact with people of more different cultures, nationalities, sexual orientations, tribes, ethnic groups, professions, political outlooks, ideologies etc. etc. etc than prior generations.
In my family, my brother and I are the first generation not raised on a farm. For our parents, until they migrated to the United States, and many others in their small Italian village of 6,000, their lives revolved around the people they knew in a 7-mile radius. Very few acquaintances came from nearby towns, a few from the nearest two small cities, and in extreme circumstances, the largest nearby city. Even their most extensive networks were in a 50-mile radius. My grandparents rarely went to Naples (50 miles away) and had never been to Rome (151 miles away). My father tells me stories about how growing up, people from the river felt different from those from the hills or the villages. For us today, those differences feel minimal.
In our current world, while we are exposed to people from all around the world, in school, work, community or play, conversations are not easier.
While I know that exclusion can be intentional, in my work, I have found that “mainstream” often excludes “others” for the fear of not being able to “manage” the conflict that may surge given the differences among people in the conversation. I think there is some truth to those fears.
But before we get to skills, let’s check our assumptions. Why is inclusion important? Why should we care? Here are some reasons why.
- Effective strategies – Whether you are a business, a non-profit, an organizer, or a teacher, you probably don’t want to waste your time. When we are faced with new situations with diverse audiences, we often problem solve with friends or colleagues to help find the best solution to our woes. If, in preparation, you only talk to people who look like you, it’s very likely that your strategy will be ineffective once it hits a wider, more diverse audience. This doesn’t mean that the people who helped you were “wrong.” It simply means that you also need advice from people similar to your ultimate audience to come up with the right strategy. This can be especially tricky when the situation is raw or your thoughts about it are raw. Knowing how to talk with someone who doesn’t walk, talk, think, or look like you to get back genuine, insightful feedback is essential to your planning. It takes skill to get more than a cordial “it’s ok” so that when you act, you are more likely to hit gold.
- Creativity – Misunderstandings are quite easy in the presence of different mindsets, so building your ability to have a good conversation across differences means also building your capacity to be creative, flexible, original, genuine, and positive all at the same time. Needless to say, this deeper, richer way of thinking about human beings can help you in other areas of your life too.
- Support – Most of us could use more support. Sometimes we get so used to having minimal support that we stop looking for people who share our vision. Instead, we work harder. When we build our capacity to have inclusive conversations, we are also building our capacity to see the common threads between our own passions and that of others. We learn to build more effective partnerships and alliances that help reduce or eliminate our isolation. Our connections become more genuine and we discover more support than we thought possible.
- Happier society – Most people are struggling to be seen and heard. Many conflicts originate from people pushing to be heard or pulling away for fear of not being heard. When we build our inclusive conversation muscles, we can use those tensions to help people be seen and heard the way they want to be seen and heard. The result is often releasing of fear, anger, and shame and more compassion. I daresay, that when we exercise these muscles more as a society, we can be a whole lot lighter and a whole lot happier.
- Wisdom – One of our greatest myths about people who are on the margins of an experience, such as the dropouts, the naysayers, and the skeptics, is that they do not understand what we we are doing and are critiquing from a place of ignorance. Rarely do people admit that folks disengage precisely because they do understand, they do see things, dynamics that people in charge sometimes do not. They see the limitations of what is being done, think it will fail, don’t see space for their critical input and bail. Inclusive conversations help us engage with the margins of our practice to help us see our blindspots before they tear apart our whole vision.
Ok. You think you can just talk to people? You don’t think having inclusive conversation requires building a skillset? Check out my next blog….