Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

          When I thought about an example of microaggression for this assignment, I thought about an incident which happened during my internship as a counseling student.  I often had the opportunity to counsel with students on campus and more often than not, these were students of diverse backgrounds.  The one incident that stands out so vividly in my mind happened with a young Caucasian man from Alabama.  When he signed up for the extra credits, he was unaware of who the person would be that would counsel him.  When I went into the room to escort him to the cubicle where we would be working, he was totally surprised to discover I was a female and was African American.  The way that I discovered his surprise was that he stated to me, “I did know that you would be the one I had to talk with”.  When I asked him if he thought it would be a problem, he stated that it would be because I would not be able to understand him or his life and he did not want to tell me any of his personal business.  When I asked if he would prefer a different counselor, he said yes as long as it was someone like him.  I then asked if he wanted a male counselor, he stated that it did not matter as long as it was someone like him.  I then asked if he would prefer a white counselor and he stated that he would because he thought they would understand him better.  I told him that I did not have a problem with his preference and that he could make an appointment with one of the other counselor that he felt would be able to help him. 

After this incident, I then had a supervisory session with my instructor, who observed all of our sessions and a couple of my colleagues from class.  What I had to realize is that this was not an isolated incident and that I would ultimately encounter other people who would feel this way throughout my practice.  I initially had many mixed reactions afterwards.  There was anger, disbelief, surprise and later acceptance.  The anger was because I was unable to voice my feelings at the time the student was with me about what he said.  The disbelief and surprise was because he is on a school campus, in a dormitory, with so many diverse groups, how is he able to co-exist with them when he harbors such disregard and obvious feelings of superiority toward minorities. The last feeling was acceptance because I was able to understand that although he felt the way he did, it did not reduce who I was or my ability to do my job.  I worked through my feelings within my sessions with my supervisor and was able to overcome the microaggression of racial and gender discrimination which were clearly intentional. 

Although the young man did not make his statements in a disgusting way, but in a superior manner which let me know that he did not feel that I was capable of being of any service to him.  If I had not gone into a session with my supervisor immediately after this happened, it may have had a very negative effect on my self-esteem and integrity and made me doubt my ability as an effective professional counselor.  I now work with children and adults of various diverse backgrounds and I have learned to not take things that are said to me personal because of my strong sense of knowing who and what I am as a person. 

Ultimately, I have learned through my observations of people and experiences that as people, through our cultural, educational, internal self awareness and interactions with others, we must respect each others difference and eliminate fear of those differences.  Oftentimes it is the fear of what we don't know that keeps us separated and unwilling to open up to others.  When we develop an awareness of who we are and an acceptance of others for who and what they are, we will learn that it doesn't matter whether we agree with their beliefs, customs, traditions, or ideas, as long as we respect them.  We must eliminate our biases toward others by becoming more secure in ourselves personally and professionally and this way we can provide services to our children and families with an open mind and embracing spirit.