 Good evening. My name is Leslie Wingo, and I am the president and CEO of Sanders Wingo. Thank you so much for being here with us this evening. Almost a year ago, to the date, I had the wonderful opportunity of meeting my friend and colleague Mark Upton Grove. With my passion for equity, inclusion, and diversity, and Mark's incredible leadership of the LBJ Foundation, we began to engage in conversations around race and history and how we can encourage others to be in action to create a positive change within our communities. This change, he and I envisioned, moved beyond tough conversations and would give people practical solutions in this historic moment of racial justice. Over the last 12 months, with the help and feedback of so many people and so many organizations in Austin and the surrounding areas, we are honored to have you join us for the first of six virtual conversations on creating a path to racial equity. I would be remiss if I didn't thank the teams at both the amazing LBJ Foundation, Sanders Wingo, our partners, and of course each of you for engaging in this critical dialogue and making Central Texas a more equitable place for each of us. We are honored to have each of our conversations recorded and to be distributed through our local PBS affiliate KLRU and KLRU will share this series with its audiences in the coming weeks. What you need to know is that as a result, you will hear Mark and Glenn close out the conversation around the 25 minute mark and then there will be a short pause. After that, we will shift from Mark and Glenn, we will shift and have Mark and Glenn excuse me answer your questions. Another exciting opportunity I would love to share with you all is each of you are invited to continue this conversation with the Central Texas Collective for Racial Equity as they will host the path to equity the after show. Every Tuesday at 6 o'clock PM on Facebook Live and if you need more information just head over to Eventbrite. We are about to get started. We're very excited to be here and as we move through our discussions I invite you to drop in questions into the Q&A function at the bottom of your screen. We will do our best to answer as many questions as possible. Now, the moment I've been waiting for it is my honor to introduce two of the greats, Glenn Singleton, founder and CEO of Courageous Conversations, who will help us understand how to have these conversations with ourselves, our family and friends and with our work colleagues and our moderator and my dear friend, CEO of the LBJ Foundation, Mark up to grow. Thank you so much, Leslie and welcome everybody. We're delighted to have you with us this evening. Welcome, Glenn. So, and Glenn, you are the perfect person to start these conversations on race because you've been doing it for nearly three decades. For our audience, Glenn Singleton is the CEO of the Pacific Education Group, which is committed to achieving racial equity in the US and beyond. You founded the organization in 1992 and it includes Courageous Conversation, an award-winning protocol for effectively engaging, sustaining and deepening interracial dialogue. But Glenn, before we go into the subject at hand and there's so much to tackle here, I want to just get your reflections on the tragic events of last week and the siege on our capital. You just moved to Washington, D.C., so you're in the midst, you're right in the epicenter of this great tragedy. But when you look at January 6, 2021, destined to be a date which will live in infamy, what do you think of? Well, I mean, literally just moved, Mark, and thanks for having me, thanks Leslie. Always a pleasure to be here with you in Austin. And three days previously to the events of January 6, I moved to D.C. And so two miles away from where I'm living is a visual that was captured on TV from me like everyone else that I just could not believe. And I'm one who has predicted that this would not be a peaceful transfer of power. But I couldn't help Mark but juxtapose what I was seeing to the memory of the Black Lives Matter protests that had just happened recently in the capital and knowing the importance of black people and other people of color, really fighting for a kind of essential, essential experience here in the United States. And then to see that fight for essential being and an essential belonging to be met by a militarized government. And so seeing the National Guard in D.C. and seeing all kinds of armed people who were to serve and protect us as if the Black Lives Matter protest was to be a violent kind of demonstration, which by no means was it planned to be nor did it become. And I juxtapose that to January 6 last Wednesday when I watched literally a group of people who looked completely different than the Black Lives Matter protest whereas Black Lives Matter protest was predominantly people of color but really was a multi racial voice in this country. And so we saw everybody whereas looking at January 6, this was white America. And this was an element of white America that this country refuses to acknowledge as present. And so watching these people scale the walls of the capital and and break through windows and and do all kinds of things that were, you know, not only illegal but just a real violation of what it is that we believe to be our creed here in this country. And to see that not met with policing, not met with a kind of militarization where that's where it was most appropriate. And so the juxtaposition of that to me told really the most basic and fundamental story of this country, where some are experiencing it from from an exceptional place they are seen as exceptional whereas others are striving to just be recognized as essential. So, despite this uprising that was incited by our own commander in chief, Joe Biden will be inaugurated as a 46 president of the United States next week. And in so many ways he owes his presidency to the black community was James Clyburn in South Carolina who mobilized the black community to support him and that really gave him the momentum to capture the Democratic nomination and ultimately the presidency. Do you have hope that the Biden administration will turn the tide on racism. Well, it's not going to take much to turn the tide. Okay, because we definitely need to go in a different direction, but definitely Clyburn and Stacy Abrams we'd be remiss to to not just mention that where we saw this change is a place where a whole lot of black people live. And so at the night of the election we are watching Atlanta we are watching Detroit we are watching Philadelphia and and these are places where black Americans have been and and have voiced a kind of desire for this country to live up to its own espoused value. That's it. And so this administration absolutely is needing to answer the call that that is represented by this vote that was cast by a whole lot of black people in the United States unprecedented numbers, as well as for those who cast a vote who are not black, but believe that we need to start hearing these black voices. We need to start listening to the Stacy Abrams of the world of the society of this country, because clearly they have an insight around things that need to be done here. Let's talk about the issues that we want to address as part of the path to racial equity and this is all about education and understanding. Before I talk about the steps that you have enumerated to that end, I want to talk about what led you to your vocation and advocation for having these courageous dialogues around race. I mentioned that you formed the Pacific Education Group in 1992. You've been doing this for nearly three decades. What led you to this line of work? Well, you know, Mark, I often talk about this in the numerous trainings that I've done in Austin. My racial autobiography begins in seventh grade and growing up in an all black community and schooling up to sixth grade with all black teachers, all black students, everyone around me, family, community is black. And so my family decided and my mom led this charge that I needed to have a school experience that would give me the preparation and also give me an insight into the larger world that I was going to need to navigate. And so in a matter of months, I found myself in an all white school with all white teachers and right away I needed to learn how to negotiate my being in that environment. And it was a lot of bumps and bruises. I can't tell you the number of times that, you know, I was sent to the principal's office or, you know, I was in confrontation with my classmates. Because things were so radically different. And, and my classmates didn't understand me and I didn't understand them and, and all of us are relatively innocent in this, you know, but we needed to figure out how to have this conversation. So you sort of run that forward all the way through the University of Pennsylvania, where, you know, it's very similar. You know, I'm still my presence says we've got to talk about race. And the only way that we won't have that conversation is if I simply ignore the inequities that I'm seeing all the time and and I simply push aside the micro aggressions that that appear in what's passed off as a joke. Or, you know, just just an inappropriate thing to say to a person of color to a black person in this case. And, and so I had a kind of action research experience all the way through college and and all the way up to graduate school at Stanford where I said I've got to actually talk about how we talk about race. And so I began codifying this protocol for courageous conversation in seventh grade, but I published it in the early part of my career after being an admissions director at Penn, after working after knowing that in all of these spaces in for myself at home and at work, people needed a way to do this they wanted the how many folks knew that we had a why but they needed the how. So you have pioneered this area of talking courageously about race really nobody did this before you did. And you have enumerated for our audience, three steps toward better understanding people of color. And I want to use this time to talk about those those three steps and you begin with reflecting on race in your own life and I know from the conversations that you and I have had that when you did this with yourself it was a real journey to talk about that. Well, I want to say right up front that when you say nobody did it before me, you are absolutely correct in terms of, of creating an organization that is exclusively focused on race and and how it is that we engage in the race place to to become more effective in all parts of our lives. All of my ancestors have been in this struggle and and have added to a way of my understanding that we can do this we can have this conversation. We can actually achieve racial justice in this country, but we need a process and so this is the, the protocol for courageous conversation, if you will. This is taking the time to really reflect on what were those most effective conversations in my life and and where were the conversations that that didn't go so well what did I learn from them and and how would I do them differently again. And this is important because without this practice right there was definitely a passion around being in the race space and and feeling some efficacy and effectiveness there. That's absolute, but in order to get there I had to practice and in that practice I was going to make mistakes. I've lost friends, you know, I've not been invited to to to work in spaces because I needed to figure out how to bring my whole self in and and my skin comes with me right and and I know that when the skin comes, there is a reaction. And so I'm here to say, you know that that that we can step through this conversation and we start with self, then we go out to our friends and our family and and our closest circle, and through that we go off to work. So, so you keep on expanding the circle. That's a start with yourself. How do you start that conversation what does that dialogue with yourself look like. Well, the, the importance of recognizing that long before we get here Mark, we've been racialized, and so many events in our life have occurred through this prism of race. And so I'm giving people permission to recognize what was that first point of consciousness around race for you. Okay, and this self discovery about how I've been racialized and how these moments show up in my life have shown up and and how they contributed to events or experiences that I've had to shaping my beliefs and my perspectives. And so every single person has had racial experiences. And from those experiences, we have formed beliefs and perspectives about who we are in this racialized world, and who the other is. And so the first part is to just ask myself that question of, what does it mean, what does race mean in my life, and how did I arrive at that understanding what are those significant moments, what did they teach me, what beliefs do I hold now as a result of them. So what was the greatest revelation when you went through this exercise of self discovery. Well, one big revelation was that the insights, the consciousness that I was inviting myself into and and the literacy that I was applying to with the words the language wasn't something that was welcomed in the society that I was living. And, and so, not only did I have to figure out who I was, but I also had to figure out how to communicate that to people who did not wish to figure that out for themselves, and even not doing that wanted though to judge and describe me. And so the tension of knowing who I am, but having people who have power over me, teachers, bosses, you know, folks in a, in a random store that I need to engage with to, to buy a product. Okay, these people have made decisions consciously and unconsciously about who I am. And I needed to know who I am to form a kind of buffer, if you will, against that kind of perspective that's coming. And so knowing self is so critical. And, and when you know yourself, right, and I know myself, we can have a conversation about who we are. Then I take the onus also off of you to figure me out. Right. And if you can do that for me by by just exploring race in your life and what were those milestones and what did you learn and believe and and and come to understand from those now we can have a conversation. And your understanding of that trajectory and my understanding of that trajectory probably won't be the same. But that's the essence of the conversation now. So the notion of color blindness is a fallacy. Is that fair? Absolutely. We don't go into society blind to color. But however, I am a white person who has grown up with privilege. I don't think a lot about race. It doesn't come into my life as often as it might yours. So how do I start that dialogue with myself as a person who is not a person of color? Right. Well, well, I think one of the reasons that courageous conversation is so important is because we actually go at some of these descriptions like color blindness. It would make sense that that confuses you because really you are not blind to color. You know, I'm black. Okay. What you're blind to initially is the fact that you're white. And so we should have called it white blind. Right. Because it's not recognizing how whiteness plays out. Because for a person of color, it's virtually impossible to not see color and to have an illusion that you're not seeing race because we need to see our racial experience in order to survive. I need to know that when I'm interacting with a person who does not have my racial experience, there's a high likelihood that they're going to misunderstand, misjudge my expression, my interaction. And my desires. And so if I understand that, then I can make sense of the circumstance going on. But to be white in society does not require that you figure out if this is a safe space for you to be in physically, emotionally, spiritually. Right. So if step one is reflect on race in your own life, step two is seek other perspectives and you just alluded to them. Talk to family and friends and then expand the circle to colleagues. So let's start with family and friends. How do you approach those conversations? Well, it's critical that we start here also because these are the people who have been with you the longest, right? And these are the people who have developed some capacity to let you be a learner in their presence. And so as you are discovering how race plays out in your life and you're talking about the beliefs that you form as a result of these racial interactions, your family is going to be those who are most likely to have some connection to the experiences that you're talking about. They too will have perspective and belief versus a stranger. And the scenarios and the experiences are different. This is also true with your friends. And because we are all different, we human to be human is to explain diversity. So no two people, identical twins growing up in the same home are going to have the identical experience and perspective. But it's going to be as close as it can get in that household or in that circle of friends that we've curated. And so that's where we start to test this idea of multiple perspective. Because we have to be prepared for the multiple perspective and not allow that to cause us to disengage from the conversation. OK, so let's talk about those perspectives which are racist. And there are so many families where you have uncomfortable conversations at Thanksgiving and it's because of those very different opinions that you alluded to earlier. But there are racist members of our families and there are racist friends we have. How do you confront that? How do you have a dialogue with somebody who is openly expressing racist views? Yeah, there are a couple of stages with this. Many times people want to go right into confrontation. And sometimes people who have these ill formed prejudices and in the form of race, this racism that they begin to express versus a more tacit, unconscious that doesn't come out in epithets and things like that. First thing is you want to simply indicate that you don't share that perspective. And that right away changes the direction of the conversation. Because the person doesn't have an ally in the perspective anymore. There's a competing understanding. The second thing you want to do which is really hard for people sometimes is to have that person make deeper sense of what it is that they're espousing. Because what we know about race is that it is a social construction, it's made up. And it is one of the most problematic falsehoods that have been put into the human imagination. And so the belief that people have walking around that there's a superior body of people because of their complexion. That is deeply problematic and it is wrong. There's no truth to that. And so if I pursue you long enough in terms of your ideology that's espoused as racist, you're going to run into a wall. You're not going to be able to defend it. So I have to have the fortitude which goes back to the first thing of understanding who I am in this. There's no way that your racist ideology is going to impact how I think about my own capability. But what it is going to do is reveal your ignorance. And so if I can engage with you in terms of your perspective rather than trying to force mine on you, then you're going to exhaust yourself in terms of wisdom, in terms of truth. Because there is no truth in racist ideology. So as a practical matter, how do you begin this conversation? What words do you use to elicit from somebody their view on race? A friend or family. So you're in a safe zone here. We're about to get to work colleagues which is not as safe as zone. And we'll talk about this as it relates to that as well. But how do you enter into this conversation in a non-confrontational manner? Well, the first thing we want to do, and this country when we talk about the road ahead for us, we have collectively lost our love for humanity. And inside of humanity comes the fact that each of us, each of us lacks perfection. We all make mistakes. And so a form of racism shows up in every single one of us and we have to recognize that. When I moved from Philadelphia to Los Angeles and my whole paradigm was black and white because that's all that I engaged with. Before I came to Philadelphia, before I got to seventh grade, my whole paradigm was black. And so for many people their whole racial paradigm is their own race. And when they step out of that paradigm, which is something that we hope people would do, step out of that familiar circumstance, you're going to make mistakes because you don't know. And each of us has to continue to touch that point in ourselves. So that when we're talking to the person who is so openly and outwardly racist, if you will, we have to touch the point where we are in that space of ignorance. So what was I like when I first encountered Latino people in Southern California? How did I make that connection between my friend Fernando at the University of Pennsylvania who's Puerto Rican and, you know, my friend Marco in LA who's Mexican-American and just put them all together, right? Those were my indications of racism because I live in a society where it's not important to get the differentiation of people of color and understand their history and their perspective. So I applied it to other people of color. That's how people of color do it. And white people in America live in this intense racial segregation in their homes and communities and their recreation and their schooling and so forth. And so when they step out of that, they're going to make mistakes. And each of us, if we can remember how it felt to make that mistake, that's how your Uncle Charlie is sitting at the Thanksgiving dinner table feels. Also, he's making a mistake. He's terrified in so many ways. He has no grounds really to stand on to support it, but this is an ideology that he's brought from his experience. So you want to challenge Uncle Charlie with compassion. How did you know about my Uncle Charlie? So we start this dialogue without any hesitation. Uncle Charlie. So we start this dialogue with ourselves. We expand it to family and friends. And now we go to work colleagues. And this is where it gets a little more uncomfortable. So and let me go back to the question I asked you about family and friends. How do you enter into that dialogue? And let me just talk about my own experience. Again, I am white. So by me having this conversation, drawing somebody out on race, I might think to myself, that's racist. I am because I'm essentially saying to that person, they're a person of color. And I want to talk to them about that. Does that make me seem racist? Well, remember where we started. So if you come to me, Mark, and we're going to talk about the events of January 6, 2021 in the United States. And you start. So what did that feel like to a black person? That's not going to work out. You need to start with your narrative then. And you need to let me know that you've spent some time figuring out who you are in this matter. Otherwise, everything I share with you is subject to your distortion because you haven't figured out what are the frames and what are the sort of criteria that you're passing truth through or making sense of what is true. And so you don't start with asking the other person to tell their story. And that's what happens so often in the workplace. We're requiring that people who are already struggling to have a sense of belonging, the organization is now saying to them, but tell us who you are and how you feel and what does George Floyd mean to you? The very people who are asking those questions, you need to start with what does George Floyd mean to you? You start with your personal narrative. And so while I'm drawing you out on race, you a black man, me a white man, I start with my own experience as a white man. And that gives you an invitation to enter into this conversation in a non-confrontational way. Is that fair? Absolutely. And if you don't start there, if you start with me, I'm going to have you start with you. I'm going to indicate to you with all compassion, Mark, that yeah, I've had this conversation many times and I'm eager to have it with you. And in order for us to have this conversation, first tell me what's going on for you with this. Where does the conversation come from? What were your experiences that led you to whatever perspective you have? Let me hear that first, then I'll know how to enter in with you. And how do you sustain that dialogue? Because it's not just one conversation. It's a fluid situation and you want to be able to return to that. So how do you do that, Glenn? In terms of sustaining it, multiple perspectives is what makes these conversations interesting. And so why it is that people of color can keep having these conversations. One is because we have to. We have to develop intelligence about how the world is, how our society is about race. And we recognize that. The other reason is because there is extraordinary diversity within groups of color. And so just because my skin is black and my mother's skin is black, that doesn't mean that we arrive at the exact same perspective. And we find those perspectives interesting. So if we take that same understanding, right? White people will exist in this country in a far more sort of grounded and just a complete way. If you didn't have to walk around worried about being called racist, if you didn't have to tiptoe around what word to use and all of those things, white people carry that. And that is because of a fundamental laziness that occurs in terms of developing your own insight and understanding around race. If you just accept that race matters to you, it's important for your livelihood, for your family to really develop consciousness and to understand the diversity of racial perspective among white people. Then when we arrive together, you bring that with you. That's what makes the conversation interesting. So we started with reflecting on race in your own life as the first step. Step two is seek other perspectives. Let's talk about that last step, which is acknowledging and addressing your own biases. This seems like a hard one. How do you do that? It is because we live in this society where you can poll any organization and ask them, is there racism in this organization? And for the most part, people will say, yes, there's some. Some people will say, extraordinarily, there's tons of racism around. But if you ask people, well, who are the racist? Nobody. So how do you have racism without racism? And this is a key piece here. And then therefore, what do we mean by racist? And this is the third level because you're not ready to have this conversation if you haven't explored race in your life. And now we're going to talk about racism and racist, which is where the bias actually means something because there's now power associated here. And so in our societies and how race is described on this planet Earth, in this year of 2021 is that there is a bias towards white. In terms of the images, we're presented for beauty and intelligence. In terms of who we know will be present when there is power at the highest level of organizations from schools all the way through to our Fortune 100 companies in the country. You see white. You also have a culture connected to that advantage, that head start that has occurred in this country for white people with rights, with possibilities that were not afforded to others. And so that head start has formed not only a way of going about the day, but some beliefs about what's occurring in that day. And I have to assess as a black man, what is my relationship to that whiteness, to that image, to that culture of how we go about things, to that mindset, that belief system that comes from people generally who haven't spent a lot of time having the kind of conversation we're having now. I want to edit. I mentioned you've been doing this for 30 years, nearly 30 years. Are you more or less hopeful about the issue of race in America than you were when you started the Pacific Education Group in 1992? More hopeful. What I am is in belief that we are still experiencing racial progress, right? And even, you know, some of the unbelievably horrific images that we saw on January 6th in this country. I am a great fan and person of study to look at the John Lewises and to look at the Dorothy Heights, to look at the Cesar Chavez and the Dolores Huerta, to really see people who have been in a struggle. And through that struggle, they have seen all kinds of gains, but each of them has transitioned, or some of them have transitioned to places where they would recognize that there's so much more to do, but we've come a long way. And so as I can say that my experience is so much more open and available and just than my grandfather's experience was. He coming up from the South and running away from the violence of the Klan that killed his brother, right? I am aware of the police brutality and how it is that we have these issues that are still so present. But at the same time, there is no way that I would want to go back and live that experience that my grandfather had. And that marks to me that we're making progress. Now, hope is a different thing, right? Because hope rests in the willingness of the people to actually push forward and to improve the conditions going on, to do our part, to take responsibility, to recognize that this is going to be intellectually taxing. This is going to be emotionally draining. I'm going to be fatigued. But that's very much a part of this human experience as well. If we're not really fighting for something, then do we have the right to expect a better day? And now we're going to take your questions. Glenn, you can see by the way why Glenn Singleton is the absolute perfect person to enter into these series of conversations we're going to be having on race. I'm already seeing comments, Glenn, about how much folks appreciate what you're saying. All right, we have a number of wonderful questions here and they're being texted to me. So you'll forgive me if I fumble this. On the subject of knowing ourselves and our own relationships with race, what are some tools that might be available to those of us who may feel like they need help along the way in our journey? Well, the tools are right there for you. You have these artifacts called photo albums and yearbooks and you have these milestones in your life connected to institutions. So you get to open up your memory. I think this is a very healthy process for us anyway because it's mind expanding. Just to take yourself back to that first moment where you knew race was real. And so what came of that for you and what beliefs came out of that and then go to the next milestone. And so they're these very personal ones and then they're very public ones. When I moved to LA in 1990, the very next year, we found ourselves in this crisis because of Rodney King. And then the OJ Simpson trial. So these are racial markers in our society and so much of our society has taught us to sort of stuff that away as soon as we can. And in the modern world, the new cycle is even shorter. So it gives us permission to forget about January 6 because we're on to the next thing. I'm asking us not to do that. I'm asking us to market. I'm asking us to create a journal and really explore who am I in that matter. I need to look at the fact that, you know, when Rodney King was severely beaten by those police officers in CME Valley and it was all over TV. That brought a kind of rage for me. It also brought an insecurity. I was out in LA and I didn't know those roads. So I was afraid to drive. I was afraid to go out. I didn't know the proximity from CME Valley here, but I really did have some beliefs about law enforcement really become deeper in my spirit of my belief. And I have to own that. So I'm digging out of that Rodney King experience still in my life. Right. Because there's no moment where I mark on my whole racial timeline, my autobiographical sketch where I see myself developing this radically different idea about policing. Yeah. And so those are the moments. So we have these personal artifacts and we have these very public moments, you know, how you functioned around 9 11. Okay. These big moments in society. You know, what comes to your mind when you hear build a wall? Okay. These are not private conversations. These have been, they're occupying space in your life. So actually get into your life and recognize how you formed around these ideas. Fabulous. Next question. What about willfully ignorant people? When it is permissible f at all to disengage from openly willfully ignorant folks, ie unfriending phenomenon on social media. Yeah. So there is a whole lot of conversation about when we are showing up as people who are just intolerance, intolerant of difference. And when we need to pay attention to these ideas of self care. Right. So I can't have a conversation with everybody and I have to recognize that. And sometimes I just need to say, you know, I don't have the skills nor the capacity to go with you in this conversation and I remove myself. Hmm. Now, if I hear myself saying that too often, that means that I need to develop a higher level of skill and capacity. So I would say that more often if I'm not doing my own homework, my own personal work around this. Right. The second thing that that that can recognize for you is how are you choosing the environments that you put yourself in. Right. And so if this is happening so often, then this is back to you. You need to ask a question of why are you always in those environments? Why are you always around those people? How do you, how do you just getting another one here? Can you speak to the consequences of internalized racism and why it is important to acknowledge and understand its impact on communities of color? And I apologize. These are things are coming in a mile minute. And I'm glad you got to this one. Good. It goes to it goes to my first person. Right. Internalized racism is something that is known to every person of color. Right. And it starts with a recognition that communities of color have been deprived and depossessed of so many artifacts. So they're cultural and so forth. And so our living conditions as people of color is absent of what is fully possible. Okay. And I'm talking may in the material world. Right. And so internalized racism sets in when I start to have doubts about my own capacity about my own belonging about my own image. Okay. And that starts to play out in how I see others like me. Right. And so to notice whether your internalized racism sort of I don't know what the what I would call it on a scale. But if you're if you're high scale, if you're off the charts, you would notice that because they're not any people who are like you around you. Right. Right. Right. That is the indication of heightened internalized racism. You don't like yourself. So you're not going to like others who remind you of yourself. Right. Now this is important because if people of color turn against people of color, then we're giving permission to all of those who are not of color white people to continue to maintain. Their own beliefs about how we're less than. And so it is so imperative that in the point of self, we learn to love self. We learn to discover the talents, the brilliance of self. And I think about this as we instruct teachers, you know, it's so important that we help teachers to help kids of color to see this beauty and brilliance in themselves. Because society tells them otherwise. But if you notice that that child of color is not wanting to be around other children of color that grown up is not wanting to be around other people of color. There's something about self identification. Without question. This is a wonderful question. What suggestions do you have to keep emotions or reactions in check when we have these conversations? How can we put them aside in order to have the dialogue? And that's particularly important when you're talking to the Uncle Charlie's of the world. Right. How do you keep from being too emotional in order to not have a constructive healthy dialogue? Well, I developed the courageous conversation compass just for this. Right. And one of the quadrants of the compass is feeling. And this is where our emotions sit. Another part is our morality and beliefs. Another part is our thinking and our intellect. And another part of it is our social acting aspect. So in the feeling quadrant, right? First and foremost, we want to acknowledge whatever feelings we have and that they're true and that they're real. There is nothing wrong with it. We live in a society that's quite often wanting to say that you are too emotional. And that's already a relative. Who am I too emotional compared to? You got to have a comparison there. And so there's no such thing as two of that. Your emotion is your emotion. Acknowledge it. But recognize that you get to respond to the racialized situation. Not only through one aspect of your being, your feelings, but you get to respond through a variety of aspects of your being. And we shape out three others in addition to the feeling quadrant. I'm that person. I enter in through the feeling quadrant, right? But I recognize that when I get pulled over by the police, okay, my feelings aren't necessarily going to lead me to the best end. And so I need to honor those feelings. I'm feeling put on it. I'm feeling in just injustice in my face. I'm feeling angered by this. Okay, recognize it. And into my thinking quadrant. How do I maneuver this situation so that we all get home safely? Right. And so my intellect kicks in because my morality, my beliefs also of what matters most here. Okay. I live in the United States of America where we are still grappling with this issue of police brutality as experienced by people of color, particularly black men. And so my belief has to be not being right or wrong here. My belief has to be safety. What's the safest thing? And then my acting. Okay. And so you can see now that my emotion is still there. Okay, but I've distributed my response through the rest of who I am. That's critical. We call that getting centered, right? And so recognizing that I have all of these ways of responding. I need to activate my full self, not just one part of myself. I honor what that part is. That's the initial or the, the pronounced part. And I keep building myself into the situation to get centered. This is a commercial for my friend Glenn Singleton, but I have had the great privilege of attending a courageous conversation workshop here at the LBJ library. There are a number of, this is the, the home of courageous conversation here in Austin, Texas, because we appreciate and support what, what Glenn does. But if you have not had an opportunity to participate in a courageous conversation workshop, I would wholeheartedly recommend it. We have time for a couple more questions, Glenn. One is, are there books or websites that you would recommend for reading, especially for white people to help us better understand the topic and approaches and skills to improve our ability to understand ourselves and our society? Absolutely. No author starts this conversation without recommending their own book. There's another commercial here. I first and foremost recommend reading courageous conversations about race, a field guide to achieving equity in schools. And don't be thrown by the schools part. We are all connected to schools. We're all connected to education. That's our start point here, right? And so that is a conversation about how we do this conversation. The other thing though that I think is important is to read stories about an experience or a perspective or a theory connected to your own racial identity first and foremost. Right? So the key is understanding self. Because if you go into, as a white person starting out with Toni Morrison, you're going to have to make sense of an experience that's not your own without recognizing what would have your own experience been in that scenario. Right? And so it's really critical to look at those stories like white like me to, to explore, you know, my friend, Tim Wise wrote some books. You know, Robert Jensen has written some books. There are a variety of white people who are writing about white racial experiences critical to read. Okay. Just as there are lots of Richard Delgado and a variety of people of color who have written about specific racial experiences. The book by Harry Woo Yellow is, you know, one of the most important books that I've read, but I couldn't understand that experience for Asian American people without understanding how I use my own framework of the black experience to make sense of it. And I need to know when I'm doing that. And if I don't know my primary experience, I will distort everybody else's. Our last question, Glenn, we have conversations about whether or not you're discriminating racism or undoing racism. Is that possible? I submit that racism like any other addiction can only be mitigated or controlled. Yeah. You know, I've, I'm of the school of critical race theory and Derek Bell put forth the idea of the permanence of racism. And so I never set out to eliminate. What it feels like to greatly reduce racism in the environment. And I know what it feels like when we're all working together towards elimination. And so the towards is a key piece here. That's the North Star. Right. But my grandmother always told me, she said, you might not fix it, but you better die trying. Okay. And that set the stage for me to understand this conversation. And I think it's really important to have a conversation in courageous conversation called non closure. Right. And so too many people fizzle out and get frustrated because they didn't complete it. Right. And if we change the goal from completion to extraordinary improvement, we get to celebrate along the way. Glenn, I know I speak for Leslie and all of our colleagues here at the North Star. I know you have a lot of great work to do with racial equity, but for the sensational work that you do around this. Thanks so much for being with us tonight. Thank you, Mark. Always a pleasure. And thank you all for joining us. We look forward to seeing you next Thursday when Leslie will conduct a conversation with Paniel Joseph about how we got here. Thanks, everybody.