---

“Maybe belonging isn’t something that we do as a quick-fix strategy to gain racial equity or redress racial oppression.  Rather, it requires that we take a longer view of how to achieve transformative change.  As an illustration of this point, Brian McBride shared a story about what it takes to build a cathedral.”

“People who created the plans to build a cathedral would create 200-year plans! They knew they knew they would never physically step into the edifice they were designing. Maybe their grandchildren or great-grandchildren would see the end result, but the designers and builders themselves would never walk into the building they were creating. What kind of mind does it take, and what type of practice and commitment does it take, to get up and work on something you know you will never see physically? To work every day with only a dream and imagination that perhaps the next generations will enjoy what you’ve created. This is the type of work of belonging. My presence today is the gift of the decisions of a powerful Black woman three generations ago who survived slavery of the South as she dreamt of me. What are we working on and toiling over that won’t be completed in our lifetime? That’s when we know we’re actually working on something. We need to influence the culture makers, the thinkers, the practitioners, the entrepreneurs, to build differently.”

Ginwright, S. A. (2022). Belonging. In The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimagining Ourselves. essay, North Atlantic Books.

https://brenebrown.com/podcast/the-four-pivots-reimagining-justice-reimagining-ourselves/