Are you willing?
Dear Alchemy Community,
Our Alchemy community is comprised of all races, creeds and colors. We are a community of leaders; leaders that are practicing seeing the world with curious eyes, practicing hearing the world with unbiased listening, and practicing speaking into the world with compassion and respect. Our country right now is hurting and as leaders it is time for us to SLOW DOWN and ask ourselves how can we use what's occurring to grow even more as leaders?
One of the foundational principles at The Alchemy Group is to get comfortable feeling uncomfortable. It is in the "uncomfortable space" where growth and transformation lives.
Right now, across our country a powerful conversation is being had - it is getting louder, sometimes dangerous, most times peaceful. It is a conversation about equality, morality and peace. For many, not having the conversation would be easier. However, best we can tell, NOW is the time to have some uncomfortable conversations.
Sandy and I are white women who have benefited from white privilege. We haven't acknowledged this or shared that this unconscious privilege impacted our professional journeys, making many things easier. We will never know what it's like to walk into the world with brown skin, to be looked at differently and sometimes (often) with hostility or fear. We have many people of color and backgrounds coming into our sessions who experience this daily, inside their corporations and at the grocery store. This makes the path to leadership a different, more challenging one, and it makes leadership itself a different and more complex experience.
NOW is the time for us, as leaders of Alchemy to step outside of our comfort zones and have the uncomfortable conversations. We invite you to take on this exploration on with us. Are you willing?
How can we, starting now, LISTEN more, getting curious about this situation from the point-of-view of an African American; listening with no bias and no filter of "right vs. wrong"?
How can we LEARN more, getting curious about what we don't even know that we don't even know about living in this world as an African American?
How can we LEAD more, getting curious about the powerful questions we could ask our African American colleagues and friends, generating a new future together?
And, we challenge you: What is an uncomfortable conversation that you need to have and aren't having? This could be with your colleagues, your boss, family, your friends, your children ... Now is the time to get comfortable feeling uncomfortable so that we can create a brighter future together.
Sandy & I are here to assist you in practicing these conversations with openness and precision speaking. If you want to talk and get coaching around a challenging conversation you want to have, get time on our calendar. Reach out and we'll make it happen.
IT IS TIME ... We as leaders and as a country ARE MORE THAN WHAT WE HAVE BECOME.
Allie & Sandy
