Who? What? When? Where? How?

I met with my brothers last night and we had a very good conversation concerning our roles in our lives and our respective communities. Our lecturer for the evening spoke on tatics and strategies derived and conceivably implemented by Dr. Na’im Akbar, via his book, Breaking the Chains of Psychological Slavery.

I learned that there are stages we as the derivative of slaves have encountered throughout our process of ‘getting free’. We first broke the physical confinements of slavery by making our way off of the physical plantation. That was step one; to live life not defined by and confined to a Massa’s every wish and command. Once this was achieved we through the Civil War and throughout the Civil Rights Movement fought for the legitimate right to live as individuals. Legally that is. We deserved and believed in the legitimate legal right to not be enslaved. Next was the ability to access the same things our oppressors had access to. Albeit schools, churches, stores or restrooms. We wanted the ability, the physical opportunity to go and be wherever anyone else could go or be.
So far we’ve traveled through 3 stages and maybe 300 years.

1. Breaking the physical bonds of enslavement.
2. Legal Civility and Legitimate rights to freedom.
3. Access to……..

Our next stage of ‘get free’ evolution was to live a life of value equal to or surpassing that of our ‘former’ oppressors. We decided our quality of life should be as good if not better than that of the majority of this land. We should not have to attend lesser quality schools and grocery stores. Our schools and stores and overall community should be just as good if not better than any other.

So now we are 4 stages deep into the psychology of what it takes to get free from captivity. The last one is arguably the first and last, and most important of all: differentiation and definition. To differentiate ( to set apart from; to become distinct or different in character) and to define ( the act of determining, a statement expressing the essential nature of something; the action or the power of describing, explaining, or making definite or clear.) This is such and important step because if you look back every step since 1. 'Breaking the physical chains of enslavement’ have depended on the premise of having a separate identity. How do we say our schools should be better when there is now definitive ‘us’? How do we practice collectivity when we don’t know or understand what brings us together? Who are ‘we’? Blacks? It was said last night that blacks can be compared to mutts in the animal kingdom. What do any two mutts share?
That statement is not to infer that they do not share anything, but it begs the resolution of a definitive ‘what?’