Integration As A Cornerstone

Learning for the sake of learning is never the thing. Talking for the sake of talking doesn’t do it either.

Integration has to be a cornerstone of what you do in pursuit of your Imperfect Allyship®.

Conversations and content are the places we start, but they have to become part of how you create action, how you learn and unlearn, so you can move through the world in a more equitable way.

India interviews Erica about what she’s integrating in her life and her practice of Imperfect Allyship®.

Listen on your favorite podcast player or keep reading to learn:

• Why confronting perfectionism means digging into the narratives you have about yourself and your work

• How reconsidering your normal extends to Erica’s parenting

• Why community is essential to integration

Grappling with Imperfection

On the Pause on the Play® podcast, India says that a current theme in Pause on the Play® The Community is integration and that she and Erica “have a similar value that consuming and consuming and consuming and not taking action with it is not what we’re here for.”

Following up on their conversation on the Flaunt Your Fire® podcast, India is asking Erica about what she’s integrating into her life and practice of Imperfect Allyship® right now.

Erica says that at the moment, “the thing that I have been grappling with the most has been imperfection…I regularly have to remind myself that I’m not going to do everything the ideal way.”

She continues, “I’m really checking, what’s my story, what’s not my story…questioning whether or not this is mine or this came from someone else. And I feel like really going there is a big part of leadership for me. Because if I can’t do that, then I’m no good to anybody as a leader.”

One of the reasons Erica is currently digging into her relationship with perfectionism is the recent workshop in Pause on the Play, The Community with Amenah Arman on Bad Art and perfectionist narratives.

That “kind of triggered something in me and made me start to question some old stories and old narratives around perfection, around what creativity really is or isn’t, and what’s good enough.”

Working through those narratives, Erica says, has made her itchy in a good way.

“I had no idea how the lack of creative output, how the perfections, and how the ‘it’s not good enough’ ties back into these old stories of I’m not good enough…I’m recognizing them and I’m like, oh, there’s some work to be done here.”

In the spirit of outside accountability, Erica says that one big project she’s been hesitating on is writing a book. 

“I have been wanting to write a book for years…And I’ve been really scared to finish outlining this book…Half has been outlined and I just keep hitting a point where the further and further I get in it, I’m like, hmm, maybe not yet. Maybe it’s not good enough yet.”

Despite regular encouragement from her community, she still grapples with those feelings that she’s not ready.

But, “I really need to embody the imperfection that I remind my clients and our members of Pause on the Play® The Community, that imperfection is not only desirable, but it’s welcome. I need to do that for myself.”

Whose Story Is It?

India adds that we also have to question where the standard of perfection is coming from. “What standard are you trying to compare yourself to? Who’s determining what perfection is?”

Erica says that fears of how her work would be perceived on release also hold her back. “There’s this piece of, will it be received well? And if it’s not, what does that mean about me? And it’s just head trash, and I know that. And here I am with a whole book that I just won’t release all at the same time.”

Those stories and fears about not being good enough, “Some of it I received as stories from families of origin growing up, but there’s also that piece of, as a Black woman, is it good enough?”

Yet, she says, there are so many white men and white women, who regularly put out mediocre books that sell well and make money. 

But, “I want to put out something that is actually thought out, heartfelt, comes from a place of love and intention and support. And I’m the one that’s questioning that. And I have to really move back and be like, why am I letting this white supremacy narrative tell me that as a Black woman, what I have to bring isn’t curated enough or good enough to be put out right now? And I know it’s a lie.”

She says there was certainly a time when she wouldn’t have recognized the underlying narratives and been able to pinpoint that it isn’t her truth that her work isn’t good enough, but that it’s still a process she’s going through.

But a recent day of inspired writing, “was a reminder that there’s so much power and so much richness and so much amazingness that is always there. And I have to remind myself that it’s a necessity to model that if you’re open for it, so much glory and goodness is constantly being delivered to you. If you’re open to receiving it.”

Reconsidering Norms in Parenting

Another frequent source of questioning and integration for Erica is reconsidering your normal.

She says recently, it came up for her in response to an article shared in Pause on the Play, The Community. The article was called “When You’re Mixed-Race, Authenticity Is an Uphill Battle” and discussed mixed race and multi-racial identities.

Erica says that as part of that conversation, it really brought home that “part of my Imperfect Allyship® is to my children. I identify as a Black woman, both of my parents are Black. My children are [mixed race].”

So while her children do self-identify as Black, there are differences in their identities and nuances they don’t share because her children are multi-racial.

She continues, “when you are mixed or multi-racial, there’s a lot of different parts of your identity that you are reconciling, exploring, and figuring out what really feels like it is yours, as well as how the world processes you and how it takes you in…Recognizing that I identify differently than my children and that the things that I am doing to support them is part of my allyship to them–It really hit me.”

Allyship and advocacy influence how Erica approaches parenting in general.

India adds, “you’re modeling a certain amount of decision-making process and behavior and approach to parenting that I’ll be there first to say, and some of the people I’ve been exposed to, maybe they’ve never seen before.”

Erica says she didn’t see this mode of parenting in her life before either. “I grew up at a time when parenting was definitely very different…There was no blueprint for it at all, and it’s still very much a work in progress and it’s very collaborative. It’s co-created…Yes, I am the adult in the sense that you don’t know everything yet and so I am here to guide you…but I really do try to make sure that it’s coming from a collaborative space.”

That collaboration also includes acknowledging and asking for consent from her kids before she shares anecdotes about them, and never sharing their photos online or on social media.

“I don’t share those types of things because they need to be able to know from a young age that they always have access to consent. And I don’t think that children are really given that narrative very often at all.”

She continues, “It’s really that my children understand that they have the option, and access to feel how they want to feel and choose what they want to say yes and no to, so they don’t become adults that struggle with it, as much as possible. I can’t fix everything, but let me try to plant some good roots.”

Community Is Essential

India says grappling with imperfection, confronting which stories are yours, and reconsidering the norms of parenting, also brings up asking what is essential and envisioning freedom.

She asks Erica what’s showing up for her and what she’s integrating.

Erica says, “As a Black woman in America, I’m having to remind myself that I have more access to being free than what I feel like I do sometimes. Even if it’s only in my own head. And so I have to decide, on a day to day, moment to moment basis, what is freedom for me? What do I need that to be right now? And figuring out how to get through that.”

And what’s essential, she says, is “making time for things that I want and need, that aren’t necessarily what I do.”

But she adds, “So much of what I do professionally is an extension of what shows up in my life and how I live on a day to day basis, and it’s a humbling thing to recognize that there is a certain amount of integration between my personal and professional life.”

It’s a constant work in progress, but “I make sure that mistakes or stumbles are not just for the sake of, ‘oh, this didn’t go well,’ or ‘oh, I failed,’ or ‘oh, this didn’t work out the way I thought.’ It’s a learning opportunity…And sometimes my overthinking brain can turn it over too many times, but…I am not one to let an experience go untapped for everything that it is going to provide.”

She also notes that this is never a process she undertakes alone.

“This is about me figuring out things and being in conversation with those that matter to me…this is all based in community. It’s based in the people around you, the people that you choose to support you, the people that you support, the people that you’re interacting with, the people that you are interdependent on. None of what I have gone through, or what I’ve shared today, could be a thing without the people around me.”

Ready to Dive Deeper?

If you want to be in conversation with others committed to integration and being Imperfect Allies®, Pause on the Play® The Community, gives you the opportunity to show up, learn new things and new ways of being that you can integrate into your allyship.

Join a supportive community who are in action to change themselves and the world around them for the better. 

Learn more at PauseOnThePlay.com/Community