November 16, 2021

Rhonda Magee: The Inner Work of Racial Justice

11/22/2021 – Victoria Robinson

Professor of law at the University of San Francisco, Rhonda Magee uses law and legal history as a platform for her transformative work in mindfulness, education and social justice. With extensive experience in conflict engagement and group facilitation, Magee’s teaching and writing draws on compassionate practice, storytelling and analysis as inspiration for a new way of thinking about our place in a rapidly changing world.

“[Mindfulness] is a way of being in contact with the sensation of being alive,” says Magee in a 2018 interview with The Highlands Current. “When you are in that place, you can say, ‘This is the best way to respond.’ It allows you to pause, note the temptation to be reactive, and deal with it.”

Steeped in the pressures and standards of academia, college students can fall into the trap of intellectualizing their experience, directing all their mental, emotional, and physical resources into producing measurable results. However, when we ignore the very present reality of our feelings, our mind, our bodies, we lose the ability to understand our responses to our environments and truly be present in the moment. Mindfulness helps us build resilience to discomfort, anger, sadness, or other emotions by noticing our responses, moving through them, and taking action in a manner that aligns with our values.

But how does mindfulness translate into a more just, less racist society? “Practicing mindfulness meditation and compassion practices lead, over time and with commitment and an attitude grounded in love, to a lessening of bias,” writes Magee. “They assist us in overcoming our tendencies to turn away from the evidence of bias in our midst… and instead, to develop a deeper understanding of how bias works in our lives.”

If we are to solve a problem, we must recognize, understand, and move through the problem, even as it manifests in our daily lives and sense of self. “Through learning about bias and how it works today, how history and institutional practices work together to maintain patterns of privilege and subordination, with the support of mindfulness practices, we grow in patience, in empathy, in our capacities to hear from and care about one another.”

And for a world of increasingly apparent division and conflict, developing the capacity to address fears and dissolve barriers is a survival skill. If we are to answer the call for racial justice in our families, our organizations, our companies and our communities, we need to expand our understanding of the individual’s relationship to their surroundings.

As the first installment of the three-part Resistance Through Resilience lecture series, co-hosted by The Resilience Lab and the Center for Communication, Difference, and Equity, Rhonda Magee will bring her internationally renowned book to the University of Washington on December 7, 2021. The talk will further break down the strategic importance of mindfulness and personal growth in the work of racial justice, and explore the transformative work of self-care in the pursuit of community sustainability.

EDIT 1/12/2022: Watch the recorded livestream below!

 

_References:

_{Magee, R.V. (2016). “If you plant corn, you get corn”: On mindfulness and racial justice in Florida and beyond. Florida Bar Journal, 90(4), 36. https://www.floridabar.org/the-florida-bar-journal/if-you-plant-corn-you-get-corn-on-mindfulness-and-racial-justice-in-florida-and-beyond/}

_{Magee, R.V. (2021). The inner work of racial justice: Healing ourselves and transforming our communities through mindfulness. Rhonda V. Magee: My Book. https://www.rhondavmagee.com/my-book/}

_{University of Washington. (2020). Well-Being for life & learning: A guidebook for advancing student well-being at the University of Washington. Retrieved from: https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/uw-s3-cdn/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2021/01/20101850/WBLL-Guidebook-FINAL.pdf}

_{Rooney, A. (2018, September 28). 5 questions: Rhonda Magee. The Highlands Current. https://highlandscurrent.org/2018/09/28/5-questions-rhonda-magee/}