Today, as we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. and reflect on some of the darker days in our history, I think about the work we have in front of us to reconstruct the American divide.
King’s vision was to eventually become color blind. And yet, this past year, instead of being hopeful about unity, racial and gender equity, hate was given hope.
We are on a mission at Covert Leadership to reunify our country. To remember the good in people. To find hope. Reunification has a very specific meaning for me. In German the word “wiedervereinigung” refers to reunifying East and West Germany. I never thought this word would describe a much needed movement in the United States, too. And yet it has.
We have all become so careful with our words, so divisive in our anger, so outraged by bullies that we fight as bullies.
It’s time to find a way to get back to articulating basic common values of America. We can reunify this country. I believe we can. We first need to unpack our anger, let it go, and stand up for human rights and civil liberties of every American. As King wrote from jail in 1963, “Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
Your mission, if you choose to accept it: Reflect on what reunification means to you. Write down your thoughts, ideas, actions and share. Connect with your community to learn what reunification means to them. Create dialogue and co-create a list of shared American values. What do we want to stand for, live for, fight for?
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