Self-Awareness of our Own Biases

Are you?...

Biased. The fact is that everyone is. All of us are guilty – and that means all of us, individuals and institutions alike, have a responsibility to be a meaningful part of the solution. The reason is that we are all a product of our own experiences and upbringing, and so it makes sense that each of us will have our own opinions across all kinds of issues. Let’s call it implicit or unconscious bias. We all possess our own bias in different ways as a result of how our family raised us. Before you stop reading because you claim not to have any, I challenge you to understand unconscious bias which refers to our attitudes and beliefs that happens automatically when our brain associates with a trigger. We’ve seen or read about this type of unconscious bias which tends to focus on bias associated with things such as race or skin color, weight, language, gender identification. This bias can contradict our known beliefs, the one’s that we believe to be true.

The first step is to acknowledge that to have these biases is to be human. Recognizing that we can hold our own world views that are being shaped by our experiences, values, education, friends, peers and family is normal. These differences between us can make the world an exciting, intoxicating, interesting and sometimes a scary place. The latter because these variances in our viewpoints can also lead to problems. If we can’t learn to accept – not agree with, but accept others and embrace our differences, we will continue down a very deep scary rabbit hole. Therefore, it is essential for us to conduct a self-awareness in order to learn to become tolerant of one another as well as being open minded towards the lifestyles and beliefs others holds. Developing self-awareness is an ongoing process, so take the time to gain the insights that will gradually help reduce the influence of your personal biases. This is a call to us all and acts as the beginning in making our community, our workplaces, our cities a better place. And if each of us took this challenge, in a matter of time, we can work toward making our world a happier place.