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Podcast Note: This conversation was recorded in 2018.\xa0 We had some connection interruptions in a few spots.\xa0 Stick with it.\xa0 Good stuff here.\nStandout Quotes From This Episode:\nWe struggle to hold the complexity of our sameness and our difference at the same time.\nWe all get anxious with difference but we must interrogate what we do with our anxiety in order to stay in connection.\nIt is important we sustain engagement when it gets uncomfortable and not bail on tough conversations.\nSidewalk Talk is an act of social justice.\n\xa0\nDr. Shelly Harrell is a Psychologist at Pepperdine University and a Couples Therapist.\nShe has built a meta transactional framework called PEaCE for interacting across differences and holding a larger context in mind. (Person-Environment-Culture - Emergence).\nDr. Harrell grew up in Detroit Michigan during the civil rights movement which shaped the lense she brings to the field of psychology.\xa0\n\xa0\nAnxiety About Difference Is Not A Sin\nWe all have a physiological response to faces that are racially different than our own.\xa0 It is not a sin that we have this reaction to difference.\xa0 The challenge is we tend not to know how to stay with our normal discomfort.\n\xa0\nHolding Our Human Complexity is Hard Work\nOne of Dr. Harrell\u2019s favorite quotes by an anthropologist is \u201cWe are simultaneously like all others, like no others, and like some others.\u201d She shares how we struggle to hold that complexity at the same time.\n\xa0\nWhere Connection Goes Awry\nTo get away from our discomfort of difference we do one of the following:\nTry to make everyone the same \u201cwe are one\u201d or \u201cI don\u2019t see color\u201d,\nDehumanize people who are different.\nPity or save which is a form of distancing and disconnection.\nGet \u201coverly fascinated\u201d by this person\u2019s identity like they are an anthropology subject.\n\xa0\nDr. Harrell was excited by Sidewalk Talk and its potential to help us value interpersonal stories and show up and have a larger lense on the socio-political factors that may shape individual stories. For folks that are in the dominant culture, it would be easy to ignore individual stories. She hopes Sidewalk Talk grows beyond the sidewalk.\n\xa0\nYou can find out more about Dr. Harrell and her work at: https://www.shellyharrellphd.com