Year of Discovery: Week 2
By: Audrey Cheng
Tags: Race Relations, Reflection, Discovery, Clarence Avant, South Africa

I want to start this week’s post by sharing a huge hug and appreciation for the people in my life — the wonderful, kind and encouraging souls I’ve been lucky enough to cross paths with so far. Since my post last week, I’ve received messages filled with useful tools and tips, people offering their time to guide me through a few exercises and words encouraging me as I embark on this often-ambiguous feeling journey. Thank you for being in my life and for making me feel supported.

The interesting part of letting the dust settle after the usual urgency and race of a purpose-driven life has been how present I’ve become to the wisdom of my body, the increasing trust I have in the universe (and the not knowing) and how completely at awe I am with the wisdom and life experiences of others and how much there is to learn from every person. In every article, book or movie I watch or in every conversation I have, I’m enjoying observing how my heart moves in a certain direction or another and being able to spend the time asking myself why that is.

Favorite quote this week by Mourid Barghouti (shared by my friend Pri):

What is needed here is slowness. The vibrations of the past will take their time until they calm down and find a form in which to rest. This needs the slowness of a magician. A precious slowness, allowing feelings of comfort and calm to work their way gently within us. These feelings do not form at once or suddenly. Slowness teaches us how to accept the new; to regard it as natural and the way things have always been. We have to live the new intensely and slowly.

This last week, I’ve seen my conversations and insights flow into three main categories: political systems, race relations and being Taiwanese abroad, and self-actualized confidence. Today, I’ll share reflections on each of these categories as my general curiosity has led me to a deep exploration around identity and on broader systems that make up the world. Being in South Africa during this time has been particularly interesting as I explore these topics.

Political systems

I’ve been diving into Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China, which has been the most captivating and humanized story of China’s evolution. It was recommended to me a few years ago and when a friend shared it with me again recently, I decided to dive into it. What’s been most eye-opening to me has been how little I’ve known about the real changes of power through China’s modern history and what the Chinese have had to go through on a day-to-day level to get to where they are today (to stun the world on the incredibly fast economic development and rise). This last week, I also watched The Motorcycle Diaries, which is about the journey that influenced Che Guevara’s Marxist beliefs. That led me to reading more about the ideologies and belief systems outside of the ones around democracy and capitalism that I grew up in. Some of my takeaways and questions:

We are working to build a better world. But who is a better world serving? Is it the elite or the masses? What does a successful world look like? As the world becomes more divided (with the rich becoming richer and the poor becoming poorer), will the majority of those in power be willing to yield their resources to create a more just and equitable world?

If there are always winners and losers in any political system (with some reversals), do we just need to have faith that the world will readjust on an equilibrium and to allow impermanence to play its role?

Is it possible to lead without ego or is ego inevitable in a rise of power? What is the difference between having a strong ego with having a deep belief and trust in oneself? Is it possible to cultivate enough of a deep understanding of our reason for being (to reduce suffering in ourselves, others and the world) so that we can lead without ego?

“Mao found the idea of peaceful progress suffocating. A restless military leader, a warrior-poet, he needed action — violence action — and regarded permanent human struggle as necessary for social development.” — Is peaceful struggle possible? Or does struggle allow for a readjusting of power so that no one group yields too much power?

Race Relations and Being Taiwanese Abroad

Last Thursday evening, I called an Uber to bring my Ghanaian friend and me to go to an outdoor movie. While the Uber drove up the one-lane road which led to a cul-de-sac, another car pulled up behind the Uber just as we were getting in. The woman, a white South African, angrily honked and asked us to get out of her way. I was confused and quickly shrugged it off to the woman having a bad day. As we drove up to the cul-de-sac and U-turned to leave, we noticed the woman’s car blocking the road. She had parked and gotten out of the car, looking at her phone. My friend exited our Uber to ask the woman to move the car and in her indignation, the woman outright ignored my friend’s initial attempts at conversation. After a few minutes of trying to reason with the unreasonable, my friend apologized (for not asking the Uber to make enough space to allow the woman to pass — of which there wasn’t actually any space to do so), and the woman finally agreed to move her car, angrily driving off.

I’ve experienced racism many times in my life but I haven’t seen it drawn out so obviously like in that moment. The offense of inconveniencing the white woman by asking her to wait for 10 seconds in her car was too much for her to bear. She needed to make a point and assert her power and control over a situation that just needed basic patience and humanity. It was shocking to me the type of space that this woman felt she was entitled to occupy. In the moment we realized there was no way around as she blocked the road and the ensuing apologies my friend needed to say, it reminded me of the way minorities often feel cornered to apologize for simply being who they are. While I tried mentally applying compassion to the woman in this situation, by wondering if she’s had a bad day that led her to this child-like response, I realized that this approach was one that many minorities have taken as a way to self-soothe and cope with the realities of racism and power dynamics that dominate our lives from the moment we wake up.

This week, I also explored identity intersectionality with a Taiwanese-South African friend. It’s particularly interesting in the racial context of South Africa, which has only about 6,000 Taiwanese today. Before apartheid, because of the support the Taiwanese and Japanese governments were lending to the struggle, the Taiwanese and Japanese immigrants were categorized as white South Africans. After apartheid when the new government decided to side with China, the Taiwanese became lumped into the same category as the Chinese, which was labeled as black South Africans. The identities of the Taiwanese in South Africa — which hold the tension between their pride in their hyphenated identities with the feeling like they don’t belong in either — is one that I’ve often felt as a Taiwanese American. For more about the Taiwanese South African identity, check out Yellow and Confused (I’ve now added it to my reading list).

Self-actualized Confidence

I watched the Black Godfather this week about the incredible Clarence Avant. What struck me the most in learning about Avant and his life story is the incredible amount of self-actualized confidence he had. He knew his truth and no matter what came his way — from almost bankruptcy to incredible personal success — he was steadfast, reliable and held to what he felt mattered. In his own way and out of the limelight, he created opportunities for African Americans, fighting for equitable contracts to their white counterparts and building their own platform.

I was inspired by Avant’s unapologetic consistency. I started Moringa School because I felt a deep-rooted desire to build a more equitable world (through increased access to opportunities) and to build solutions that believed in the potential of this generation. Over the 7 years of my journey, I’ve oscillated between waves of clarity and bouts of questioning and second guessing myself. In the times of clarity, I felt unstoppable and I was able to approach every conversation with our internal team or external partners with simplicity, openness and collaboration. In times of questioning, I sometimes recoiled into my self-doubt and felt paralyzed to move forward. This came about when I felt my confidence waiver based on other people’s opinions of what was right and wrong, and second-guessed myself on if I was making the right choices and believing in the right things. I got lost in the second-guessing instead of consistently staying true to the ‘why’ behind Moringa. It seemed to me that Avant’s vision for the world has been so clear since the start of his career and has transcended time.

To reflect on:

What is my vision for the world beyond myself that I’d want to drive no matter the context and circumstances?

What do I believe to be true and what is the most urgent need to serve and dedicate my days to?

I admire Avant’s no-BS nature and how his desire to create a certain change in the world trumped his desire to be liked. While I aimed to be a strong leader at Moringa through being an avid listener, in hindsight, I’m realizing that sometimes I made decisions that weren’t as aligned to my vision because I was too afraid of not being liked as a leader. I’m learning from Avant how much respect comes from pure clarity, consistency and reliability. I’m sure many people had issues with Avant’s stubbornness or how he ‘cussed them out’, but over time, what remained was respect for his reliability. People knew what to expect from him and that meant more than anything.

To reflect on:

What can people expect from me? How do I be consistent regardless of who I’m with and what I hear from others? How do my values manifest?

In what ways is my fear of not being liked manifesting? How are my other fears serving me and not serving me now?

For me, self-actualized confidence also comes from a deep wisdom and knowing that growth is uncomfortable. The physical aches in our joints and muscles during the growth spurts in our teenage years continue into our adult years in the form of heartaches, self-doubt and cognitive dissonance with the shifting of our identities that ultimately broaden our emotional and mental ranges, increasing our resilience. Throughout my Moringa years, I was always quite hard on myself for not growing fast enough or making the right decisions, and what I’m learning in terms of the chemistry of self-actualized confidence is that during the daily learning curves where I push myself to level up, I need to learn to give myself compassion and kindness as I make mistakes or feel overwhelmed with the not knowing.

To reflect on:

What can I do to be kinder and more compassionate to myself today? What can I do to remind myself that I’m doing the right thing at the right time?

It’s not what Clarence Avant does; it’s who he is. And finding comfort that my being (who I am brought me to where I am and where I will go) is enough will build up towards a self-actualized confidence.

To wrap up my post this week, I’ll leave you with an incredibly grounding meditation I did this week. I hope it serves your soul the way it did mine: https://insighttimer.com/andyhobson/guided-meditations/falling-leaf-meditation