Black History Today 2022: In community, the power of 'I AM' becomes ‘WE ARE’
/Black History Today, created by Marcus Harden in celebration of Black History Month, pays tribute to the living legacy of Black history in our community and beyond and recognizes the people shaping the future.
Presented in collaboration with the South Seattle Emerald.
Original artwork created by Devin Chicras for the South Seattle Emerald.
““I AM… Two of the most powerful words, for what you put after them shapes your reality””
By Marcus Harden
The power of “I AM” is indeed amazing. I often wonder why that isn’t one of the first principles we teach, as knowledge of self is probably the greatest and longest lesson we will ever embark upon. One of my greatest joys is surprising people each year, penning the Black History Today Series and continuing to recognize everyday heroes and history-makers who shape our communities.
Yet, as I’ve grown and just become more aware, the power of “I AM” at some point has to transcended into “We are…”
If we’ve learned nothing else over the last two-thousand, seven-hundred years and eleven days that we’ve been in a Pandemic/Panera Bread/Panini known as COVID – which, all joking aside, has transformed our lives, way of being and way of knowing – we’ve been thrust into living the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. quote:
“In a real sense all life is interrelated. All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be... This is the interrelated structure of reality.”
I firmly believe those words. And I also believe that the 28 (maybe 27, maybe 29) history-makers who I have the privilege of honoring and sharing with each and every one of you are truly reflections of the history that is inside of each and every one of us, either happening or waiting to happen.
Their recognition is our recognition. These are people who transform communities, education, corporate workspaces, families and invariably the world. People who are dealers of hope and inspiration, and who do the work every single day to make this world a better place, one day at a time. Maybe most importantly, they are the Alchemists who transform “I AM”… into “WE ARE.”
And WE ARE… all better for having them in our lives.
Upendo,
MLH
Original artwork created by Devin Chicras for the South Seattle Emerald.
