Recording of “Exploring Your Cultural Identity” workshop now available
Are you aware of who you are and how you got your strongly held beliefs?
Do you know how you were socialized?
Do you have tools to make sure your core is full of joy, support, security, and self-esteem, rather than driven by insecurity, obliviousness, confusion and fear?
These are the challenges Dr. Chris Brooks put to an audience of pro bono consultants and learning and development leaders in the session Exploring Your Cultural Identity. It was a coproduction between Minority Business Growth Alliance (MBGA) and the Association for Talent & Development – Greater Twin Cities chapter.
Dr. Brooks, who is an MBGA board member, unpacked his own cultural identity in the session. He is a Black, male Christian, raised in Minnesota by a Jamaican immigrant mother and a white father, with a serious arrest in his past and a groundbreaking investment company in his present and future.
The people who raised and influenced him contributed to his beliefs. As did the things society told him about the world and his place in it. All this socialization contributed to his sense of who he was.
“We are socialized to fit in,” he tells participants. And he challenges the audience: What identities do you want to be most aware of in your work and relationships? Who are they serving? What parts of your socialization will you accept, and which will you challenge so you can become your best self and do your best work?
The workshop is an exploration of identity, society, and firmly held beliefs. It is an invitation to become a little more aware of your sense of self and your place in the world – and how you can wield your power to influence systems and people.
Watch the recording here using passcode fE.*54NT
Poetry excerpt shared by Dr. Chris Brooks in the Exploring Your Cultural Identity Workshop
Now I become myself.
It’s taken time,
many years and places
I have been dissolved and shaken.
Worn other people’s faces…
-May Sarton