Do you have a stack of half-read anti-racism books on your nightstand gathering dust?

Do you avoid thinking about how white supremacy shows up in your business because it fills you with dread (plus a heaping dose of fear, guilt, and shame)?

You’re not alone. And it’s time to step into the discomfort—because this conversation matters.

I recently sat down with Therapist and Anti-Oppression Consultant, Atiq Shomar, on the Deeply Rested podcast to talk about the ways white supremacy culture has seeped into our businesses—and what we can do to change it.

Here’s what you’ll learn:

✔ The history of white supremacy culture and white privilege in the therapy field

✔ Why this work is essential if you want to create safe, inclusive spaces

✔ 5 ways white supremacy might be showing up in your business

✔ 5 things you can (and should!) do to start dismantling it today

Atiq is warm, wise, and clear-eyed—the kind of teacher who makes hard truths easier to hear. I walked away from this conversation feeling empowered to make real change in my business. I think you will too. Check out Atiq's work at atiqshomar.com

Mentioned in this episode:

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Meagan

 Welcome back to the Deeply Rested podcast. Do you have a stack of half read anti-racism books on your nightstand gathering dust? Do you avoid thinking about how white supremacy shows up in your business because the conversation fills you with dread, fear, guilt, and shame. You are not alone, but now is the time to step fully into this hard conversation.

Today I am joined by therapist and anti-oppression consultant, Atiq Shomar, to discuss the ways white supremacy culture influences our businesses, and most importantly, what we can do to change it. Atiq makes this conversation extremely actionable by breaking down five things you can and should be doing to dismantle white supremacy culture in your business today.

Now, two quick notes before we dive into this important conversation. First, I want you to know that this episode was originally recorded for my fundraising event, the Rest and Success Code, specifically for people who run therapy businesses. So the language we use in this episode is specific for therapists, but rest assured everything Atiq shares applies to any type of service-based business that you run.

Second, since recording this conversation, Atiq changed their name from Dena Omar to Atiq Shomar. Atiq was excited to share this interview with a wider audience and consented to us releasing the conversation knowing we use their old name throughout the interview. If you wanna connect with Atiq after listening to this conversation, which I highly recommend, you can find them at atiqshomar.com.

Finally, if you want to support the Deeply Rested podcast, please feel free to share this important conversation with a few of your closest business friends. You sharing this podcast and episodes that you love with people that you love is the best way that you can support us and growing this show. All thank you for being here.

Thank you for listening to this conversation in particular. I really hope you enjoy this deeply rested conversation with anti-oppression consultant, Atiq Shomar.

Meagan

Dena, hello.

Dena

Hi, Megan.

Maegan

How are you feeling?

Dena

Good, excited to be here.

Maegan

Oh, I'm so excited that you're here, Dena. And before we dive in, I want to be transparent with our listeners about our relationship and how I how I know you. So I know you, Dena, because you have been a member of my business coaching mastermind for well over a year now. Which means I've had the incredible privilege of watching you develop your feminist anti-racism and anti oppression consulting business for therapists, and it is something very special.

Dena

Thank you.

Maegan

I've also seen you in action, Dena with people in our coaching community, and I know that you're damn good at this, that you have such a gift for stepping into hard conversations with a balance of love and compassion, but also straightforward, assertive feedback. And I think that is a really incredible and special skill that you possess.

Dena

Thanks. Thank you, great to hear.

Maegan

Well, and I think it's gonna be a big part of our conversation today of balancing that like compassion with but also, like, I have some shit that I need you to understand. And, yeah, and I just think you have such a gift for communicating that Dena. And I'm excited. I'm excited for this conversation. I'm a little bit nervous. I know that I'm going to learn a lot. I know that it's going to be challenging, and I have a feeling it's going to be the same for all of our listeners, too. So I'm wondering, Dena, before we dive in to this conversation about white supremacy in our therapy businesses, if you have any words of advice for folks who are tuning into this conversation, who are feeling nervous or uncomfortable, or maybe even thinking that they'll just skip this interview and move on to the next one, anything you want to say to those folks?

Dena

Well, first, before we get started, thanks for having me, I really appreciate the opportunity to be here. And I want to acknowledge that I'm in Tucson, Arizona, which is the land of the Tohono O'odham people. We are occupiers of their territory, and it's important for us to acknowledge who owns the land that we sit on every day. So what makes this work hard, I think is your question. Because it is hard work. It is asking people to be vulnerable in a way that they don't usually get asked to be vulnerable. It's asking White people to look at things that are really hard to look at. So I would say to anybody who's considering skipping this is that it's worth a listen. And what you might want to do is take a couple deep breaths, acknowledge the hard work that this is and that you don't have to do this alone, that we're going to talk about tons of resources today that can help people on their journey. And we want to remember that we're doing things, we're talking to therapists because they want to be better therapists and this is work that's going to make them better at their jobs, better citizens of the world and moving forward for their clients, really, truly for their clients. So there's lots of reasons to stay in this work. And it's hard. And I just want to acknowledge that up front. This is not easy stuff. And it pushes lots of buttons for lots of people. So yeah, you're absolutely right.

Maegan

So if you're wanting to avoid this conversation, you're the person who needs to listen to the conversation the most, maybe.

Dena

Exactly, exactly. That's hard to hear sometimes. But it's, it's usually true.

Maegan

Yeah. I really appreciate you starting this conversation with the land acknowledgement. And can you help me remember Dena at the end of our conversation, let's circle back to that and talk a little bit more about how people can learn about that, how they can weave that into their own businesses. I know that's not something we planned on talking about today. But I have a feeling folks have questions. So we'll just tag that on to the end if you're okay with it.

Dena

Yeah, absolutely.

Maegan

Okay, well, let's let's kick off this conversation. Today, we're talking about five ways white supremacy culture shows up in your therapy practice and what you as a therapist can do to change it. We're talking more about your clinical work as a therapist today than we are about your your work as a business owner, that conversation will come in season three later this year. But today, we're going to focus on what is happening in the therapy room. And I want to make sure we're all on the same page first about white supremacy culture, you know, what exactly is white supremacy culture?

Dena

So that's, there's a long and complicated answer to that. The short and simple answer is white supremacy culture is a system of organizing the world that ranks people based on the color of their skin. So it grew out of Europe, starting at the Crusades, really, it goes back that far. When Europeans were going to conquer the Middle East, they decided they needed a way to differentiate who's our friend and who's our enemy. And the way they did that was by color of skin. So it's a way of, white supremacy culture is a way of separating people into two categories. It differentiates between who's white and who's other. And those are really the only two categories that white supremacy culture sees.

Maegan

It's very binary.

Dena

Very binary. And it sets up lots of other binaries. Man/woman, adult/child, privileged/not lots of binaries we could talk about.

Maegan

Okay. Let's talk more about the Crusades.

Dena

Yeah, right?

Maegan

I'm like what?

Dena

Yeah, it goes back that far, right. So out of the crusades, we got chattel slavery, we got apartheid in Africa, we got settler-colonialism in the Americas, which was essentially genocide, let's call it what it was. And then we get the Holocaust. All of the same racist, racially based ideas started with the Crusades and brought us full circle to where we are today. And we can see that in so many other examples. These are just a few. And yes, the Holocaust, it was another expression of the same racism that we saw in this country on this continent that that murdered millions of indigenous folks here, that same racism, it's that same thought. In fact, Hitler actually looked to the US for ideas on how to exterminate Jews.

Maegan

Oh, wow.

Dena

Yeah.

Maegan

That's depressing.

Dena

Right? Right?

Maegan

Um, what's really, what's really resonating for me right now, Dena, is that this history touches all of us. Like there is no, there is no White person who can say like, I'm not a part of this. Because I mean, if we start at the Crusades, and then we look at colonialism in America, like here, we all are in America, most of us listening to this conversation are probably the byproduct of colonialism in some way, shape, or form. Which means whether we like it or not, we are a part of this larger, white supremacy culture. Am I getting that right?

Dena

You are, it's the air we breathe. It's the messages that we get consciously and unconsciously, both as white people and as BIPOC, Black Indigenous People of Color in this country and around the world. This isn't limited to the US. I can just talk about the US because I live here. So yeah, this is the way that we learn. We learned how to be, we learn how to be, in fact, people who have white privilege learn how to be white. We think about other people who learn how to be black or learn how to be indigenous, but White people learn how to be white too. It's just invisible, because that's what white supremacy culture does.

Maegan

You have some quotes that you shared with me earlier that were really powerful. Can you read them for us now?

Dena

Yeah, so Leila. Saad is doing some fantastic, amazing work. She's a Black author who lives in the UK. And she's doing some great work on white supremacy culture, and talking to White folks. About what white supremacy culture is and how to combat it. In fact, her book is called White Supremacy and Me, Layla Saad. She's amazing. So her first quote that I'm gonna read says that "I'm not talking about the physical color of your skin being inherently bad or something to feel shame about. I'm talking about the historic and modern legislating societal conditioning and systematic institutionalizing of the construction of whiteness as inherently superior to people of other races. Yes, outwardly racist systems of oppression, like chattel slavery, apartheid and racial discrimination in employment have been made illegal. But the subtle and overt discrimination, marginalization, abuse, and killing of BIPOC in white dominated communities continues even today, because white supremacy continues to be the dominant paradigm under which white societies operate." So that's a lot. That's a mouthful, but what she's saying is that these are systems that are there, that are visible and invisible and affect every part of our life.

Maegan

Yeah, read the next quote, because I think this really kind of like brings it home.

Dena

Yeah. Again, Layla Saad, "white supremacy is a system you have born been born into whether or not you have known it. It is a system that has granted you unearned privileges, protection and power. It's also a system that has been designed to keep you asleep, and unaware of what having that privilege, protection and power has meant for people who do not look like you." Oh, yeah, she's powerful.

Maegan

So powerful. I read Me and White Supremacy a couple of years ago, and it was hard. It was super intense. But also she has such a beautiful way of making it clear, you know, in taking these big, like I love how she says here, that these systems are designed to keep you asleep and unaware of what having privilege, protection and power has meant for the people who don't look like you. Like that really hits home. And I think we'll, we'll circle back to that idea here in a few minutes when we talk about how this relates to us as therapists, and how this shows up in the therapy room. But I want to talk more about privilege, Dena because I find that this is a word, well, for me for a long time that I didn't I couldn't define it, right. It's like, I knew that I had it. But I wasn't really sure what that meant. I didn't understand how to put that into the context of my therapy practice or my business. So can you define privilege for us and help us understand how to identify that in our own businesses and therapy practices?

Dena

Maegan

Please, yeah.

Dena

So she says, I can avoid spending time with people whom I was trained to mistrust, and who I have learned to mistrust my kind or me. So it's the ability to pick who you choose to choose who you want to spend time with. And lots of BIPOC folks don't get to choose that. They walk around in white spaces all the time, and don't have a choice.

Maegan

Well, immediately it makes me think about the private practice that they're in private practice and how most white therapists myself included for very long time had practices full of other white people. But when you think about the BIPOC clients in our communities looking around searching for a therapist of color, they maybe can't find one. And their only option is to work with a white therapist. So, I mean, immediately, there it is, like, there's a very clear way that it shows up in the life of the therapist.

Dena

Right.

Maegan

Okay, tell me more.

Dena

She says, If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure of renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford, and in which I would want to live. So the color of her skin isn't dictating who's going to rent to her, or who's going to sell her a home. And we know study after study has shown just how difficult how different this the home buying is in this country for especially Black folk. And it's it's really difficult. So she was calling that out. It's easier for me because I have white skin.

Maegan

Yeah, absolutely.

Dena

She says, I'm never asked to speak for all people of my racial group. That's a big one. Most BIPOC folk experience that at some point, usually often, I have to speak for all my racial groups, they hear oh, you're you're good for a fill in the blank, right?

Maegan

Yeah, no one's ever. No one's ever asked me to be like, hey, so tell me what's this like for white therapists? Like, what's this white like for white entrepreneurs? But same can, cannot be said for you know, what's it like to be a Black therapist? What's it like to whatever fill in the blank? Yes, that makes a lot of sense.

Dena

Yep. And the last one I'll highlight is, if my day week or year is going badly, I need not ask if each negative episode or situation has racial overtones. So usually, I can just be assured that they're not judging me because of the color of my skin. So we can also say that I might be have other things that people are judging me by, they might not like short people, they might not like people with purple hair. That is not the same as white privilege. And it doesn't, white privilege doesn't negate other forms of oppression that you might face. It just informs that that particular oppression is not coming from the color of your skin. That's really what we're talking about. It's possible to have multiple forms of oppression, and multiple things that impact you. But then we're talking about intersectionality. And that's for another day, we can get to that later. Yeah, longer, longer story.

Maegan

Sorry, Dena, go ahead.

Dena

Just focusing on white supremacy is enough, because it's big.

Maegan

It is so big. And I feel like when I've been in these conversations, and when I first started doing this work myself, I was guilty of that, the first coming up for me was like, well, not everything has been easy for me. And, you know, I've, I've had that conditioned out of me at this point in my own anti-racism work. But I see it in my family a lot at this point, you know, when, when I'm trying to engage in these hard conversations, that the first thing I hear is like, well, I was poor growing up, or I had to work hard to get where I am in my career. It's, there's a defensiveness that shows up around like, they like there's this immediate feeling I think that if we're talking about white privilege, you're you're trying to say that I've had it easy.

Dena

Yeah.

Maegan

And that's not true. And what I'm hearing you say and reinforce right now is no, no, no, there's a much bigger conversation about intersectionality. And it's really important that we're, we're able to name and acknowledge and hold space for the ways that we've all been challenged and that we've all struggled. But that doesn't change the fact that we need to be having, especially in the therapy field, a bigger conversation about white supremacy about the color of our skin and how that has impacted our work and our businesses.

Dena

Yes, yes. And there are very direct impacts from what, who I am to the work that I do as a therapist.

Maegan

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I feel like I've heard therapists who are struggling to, for example, fill their private practices. You know, well, I'm a white therapist, like I've struggled to fill my private practice, you know, so what's the difference between me and the person of color therapists who struggled to fill their private practice? We're not talking about intersectionality. We're talking about white supremacy. It's a it's a bigger piece of the pie. Am I understanding this correctly?

Dena

That's a great example. Yes, that's a great example, because there's so many unconscious biases about why somebody would not want a Black therapist versus a White therapist, that that person might not even be aware of their bias about that. And that BIPOC clients don't have the same privilege to choose.

Maegan

Whew. That's a really hard truth to say. Okay, I'm feeling clearer about what white supremacy culture really means. And what the conversation looks like and sounds like in the therapy space. But I know you have a couple of things you want to say specifically about why this conversation is so relevant for therapists. So hit me with it Dena, what do I need to know here?

Dena

So I think we need to go back I need, we need to go back and connect the dots through history. Remember when we were talking about the Crusades, and how that seems like so long ago, and then we came up through the Holocaust, and we connect the dots with white supremacy culture? Well, that's where psychotherapy comes from. So we, our profession was born out of white supremacy culture. And I think if we're not willing to address that elephant in the room, we've got some other things to talk about. And in fact, the other way that white supremacy culture shows up is just in the diagnostics, right? The DSM was written by people with a whole lot of privilege. And it continues to maintain privilege, in ways that are seen by people who are affected, and not necessarily by White middle class men who developed most of the DSM and who developed most of the treatments that we use. So when we think about the modalities, might not be appropriate for somebody who doesn't think in a linear way. And many indigenous cultures think in ways that are different than white, middle class American culture. So when we don't take that into consideration, we fall into that racist trap. Yeah. The other thing that you brought up earlier was about why is this so hard? And that defensiveness that white people feel when asked to do this work? There's a concept for that called white fragility. Rahman de Milo. Shit, am I just, I just got her name wrong. Sorry.

Maegan

Okay. It's let's, she's not listening.

Dena

Okay. Robyn D'Angelo. Haha!

Maegan

See, okay, wait, just like we'll meta process this for a moment. Like, we're allowed to mess up. Right?

Dena

Right.

Maegan

I mean, even you, you're an expert in the space, I am not. And here you are, you messed something up, and we're naming it and we're correcting it and we're moving on. It's something that I'm really trying to internalize in my own life around this work is it's okay to mess up. It's okay to own when you make a little flub, or when you make like a massive mistake, and then you can move forward and keep doing the work.

Dena

Yeah. Yeah. Cuz it's, it's messy work, right. All of the stuff that we're talking about business building is messy. Therapy is messy. We're talking about people, people are hard.

Maegan

People are hard. And there's just an extra sense of fear right now. Across the board, we're all afraid to be canceled, right? We're afraid to like say the wrong thing and to be attacked or to get backlash. And like sure that, maybe that will happen. But more than likely, it will be like just what happened here. The mistake made is not that big of a deal. We correct it. And we move forward. We're meta processing it right now, but you know, in the grand scheme of things, it's it's okay. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Dena, for your that meta process, tha teaching moment. White fragility...

Dena

White fragility is the is, it's become kind of a buzzword right now. But it's also really important to take seriously, because white fragility is that feeling that White folks run up against when they're confronted with racism. So there's a really simple equation that I like to think about with racism, right? So today, in this country, we have this idea that racist people are bad people, not racist people are good people. I want to be a good people. So I can't look at my racism, right? And we all have racism, it's the air we breathe, we just have to remember that, right? There's some shame that comes up when we talk about it. And the way to be a good people is by addressing the racism, is by looking at that elephant in the room and really saying, This is wrong, I need to do something different about that. Right? And so if you're someone who's asking, you know, why do we have to talk about this? Why do we have to do this, it means that you have some white privilege because you're not experiencing the opposite. And so I really want to challenge all of our listeners out there to really jump into this work like we said it's scary and hard we want to treat it like Fight Club or Bruno we don't want to ever talk about it and yet here it is.

Maegan

Really man look at you weaving pop culture into this conversation.

Dena

That's about as far as I go. That's as much as I have.

Maegan

Fight club and Bruno. Fight Club and Disney movies. Yep. That's right. It's it's escaping the binary again, right because what you just described racist people are bad people, not racist people are good people. I want to be good people, so I'm not racist. It's it's too simplistic. So pulling out of that you're saying is really existing in this gray space where you say, I want to be a good person, I want to be an anti-racist. And I know that I am a part of white supremacy culture, which means whether or not I like it, yes, I have some racism inside of me and I can deny it or I can choose to be engaged in the conversation to become a better person, a better a better steward of humanity or however I want to conceptualize it.

Dena

Exactly, Layla Saad says that this is love work. When we started really looking at ourselves deeply and difficultly. We're doing it because we love. We love our clients, we love our fellow humans, we love our planet. This is love work.

Maegan

That's beautiful. I hadn't heard that before. This is love work. And if I think about the other kinds of love work that I do in my life, with my spouse, with my family of origin, it's fucking hard. Like, it's really, really hard. And if we think about, let me just speak for myself, like if I think about challenging white supremacy and my internalized racism as love work for humanity, that's big.

Dena

That's big.

Maegan

Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for sharing that. Let's circle back to why this work is important for therapists specifically.

Dena

Yeah. Yeah. So this is another hard truth, I think, is that when we're not actively engaged in anti-oppression work, there's likely chance that you're causing harm to your BIPOC clients. And you're certainly not doing the work to help as much as you could. And that's hard to hear. We're therapists, because we love people. And we're therapists, because we want to help and to hear there's something that you're not doing that could help better, is hard to hear. The, and the heartening part is that there's something you can do to do better, and it's not that far removed. It's doing this work, it's jumping in with both feet. And, and we can all do better.

Maegan

A thought just popped into my head, I don't know this might this might be wrong. So I'm open to you telling me if I'm wrong, and I won't cut it out of the interview, if that's what happens. So you're saying that if you're not actively engaged in anti-oppression work, you are likely unconsciously harming your BIPOC clients, but the thought that popped into my head was well, aren't you harming your your White clients, too, by not being engaged in anti-oppression work? Because I mean, you're just you're keeping, you're keeping them trapped in the same systems that...

Dena

Yes.

Maegan

Okay. I don't know where to take that thought from there. But it just popped into like aren't we actually, yes we're, like, unconsciously, almost actively harming our BIPOC clients. But we're not doing our White clients any favors by avoiding this work, either.

Dena

No, absolutely. No, you hit the nail on the head. That's true.

Maegan

Whew, okay. I was like, I'm gonna throw this out there. We're not doing anyone any favors by not doing this work. Every day that I don't deepen my work, I'm not helping anybody. And I'm actively hurting some people. And that's not love work. Bringing it back to that frame now. Okay. All right. Um, what's next?

Dena

I think it's also, so I think one of the reasons that therapists avoid this is this idea that we shouldn't be political. I'm using the finger quotes here. We feminists like to say that the personal is political. And that therapy, I say that therapy is intensely personal. Therefore, it therapy should also be political. Our clients are experiencing these harms in their lives in so many ways. And we have an obligation and an ethical responsibility to help. And sticking our heads in the sand about white supremacy culture is not helping. I go back to, I'm a social worker, and I go back to our code of ethics. And it's clearly laid out my responsibility to help clients with social justice issues, and how that affects them. So I think we can ask the question, how does it affect clients when we don't acknowledge how these political systems work in their lives? And I think it's, it may not be clear. So let me talk a little bit about the harms that I see. The biggest one is that clients don't feel like they can bring their whole selves into the therapy room. I know I had a client, or a therapist- I had a client, but I also had a therapist in the past who didn't understand anything about Islam. I'm a Muslim, and she didn't understand anything. I taught, I felt like I was teaching her, which one, took away my time from therapy, and also made me not trust her. I'm like, well, if you don't do your own research, your own work, your own understanding of where I'm coming from, what else don't you understand about me? It built this wall, and really degraded the trust that I had for her and the relationship that we had. And we know that the relationships are the most important part of therapy, that's the thing that that brings the most change. So if I'm damaging the relationship by not understanding where my client is coming from, or not hearing my client when they tell me things, there's nowhere for that to go, this is not going to help the client, and then I'm taking their money and being a poor steward. And that's just not cool.

Maegan

Quote of the day, it's just not cool.

Dena

It's just not cool, man.

Maegan

I'm really still, my brain is still circling around the personal is political, and the application of that statement to our work as therapists and healers, because I, I'm a straight up white woman also, I'm feeling, I just had this thought a minute ago. So I'm going to put it out there. And you know, to continue our theme of meta processing, I was like, Oh, I we should have owned our identities at the beginning of this audio only conversation.

Dena

I forget, we're not on video.

Maegan

Right, but even still, we probably still should be clear about our identities, even if we are on video, right? So I'm a straight up White woman. And I went to graduate school in Houston, Texas, you know, the heart of the bible belt. And I was absolutely explicitly taught that therapy should not be political.

Dena

Yes.

Maegan

Right. Not and yes, I was taught blank slate, blah, blah, blah. Don't bring yourself into the therapy rooms, this isn't about you. Yes, those those messages were all subtle, but pervasive and consistent. But the message of don't make it political, was explicit. I that was drilled into my brain as a baby therapist of like, there is no room here for political conversations. And what you're saying, now, I just want to name this because I know I'm not the only one who was, you know, and holy shit, like, isn't that like, there it is. There's white supremacy in my, in my graduate level education. There it is. And this, this idea that you're bringing to the table right now, if I'm understanding you correctly, is throw that shit out the window.

Dena

Right.

Maegan

And let's say actually, therapy is political.

Dena

Yeah.

Maegan

Because it's personal. Because the personal is political. There's no way for therapy not to be political. And you have to stop being afraid of that.

Dena

Yeah.

Maegan Because really, like the most transformative work, especially for our BIPOC clients will come when we as White therapists specifically say, this is a political space, like, let's get real about who I am and who you are and what that's meant for your life.

Dena

Yes, yes. And how that affects our relationship. And the power dynamic that shows up in the therapy room.

Maegan

Yeah, and let's talk about that.

Dena

Yeah, let's talk about it.

Maegan

I mean, it's like terrifying, but yeah, liberating.

Dena

It gives me goosebumps. I love it.

Maegan

I mean, if we think about the therapeutic relationship being the place for corrective, emotional experiences, like, Wow, what a profound experience you can create for your client by allowing them to talk about you being a White person, like what that means for them. Oh, my gosh, I have like, chills right now. I don't even see therapy clients anymore. But I'm like, I gotta get back in the therapy room.

Dena

You're gonna want to go back.

Maegan

I don't know about that, but I'm loving this conversation. All right, Dena, this is we're about to pivot and get really specific and actionable for the therapists listening to this conversation. But first, I just want to thank you for this mini-masterclass that you've given us in white supremacy, and white privilege and intersectionality. And the history I mean, that's been really helpful for me today, is hearing the historical significance of these real systems that whether I like it or not, I am a part of right now. So this context is so helpful. And I just want to acknowledge that, again, I have a relationship with you, I know how much time and effort, energy and money you have put into learning about all of this. And here you are doing this labor for us for free. And I'm really grateful for that.

Dena

Thanks, Megan. It's also a labor of love for me when I think about where my loves are, this is one of them. And I stand on the shoulders of countless other people who are doing this work and have done this work. So I just want to shout out to my, my ancestors in this work. They are, they are doing so much out there and historically, so I would not have gotten here alone and just love the people who are doing this work. It's intense and hard.

Maegan

Thank you. Thanks for saying that. Here we go, okay are getting super specific, we're gonna move through this pretty quickly because I know people's emotional, their emotional tolerance is probably, it's waning as we get deeper into this conversation. So let's, let's get clear about five ways that the therapist listening to this conversation might see white supremacy culture in their real life, private practice.

Dena

So this list was so hard to put together, not because there I couldn't find five, but because I had to limit it to five. So the first five that came to my mind, the first one is you, quote, don't see race. I hear that so often from White people. In fact, a therapist just said that to me, just two days ago, she was I was interviewing her as a potential supervisee. And she said, I don't I don't even know what the BIPOC, LGBTQ, whatever, whatever those letters are, right? I don't see people, I don't know what those things stand for. She said, I see everybody as souls. And I was like, Oh, honey, like, we're all embodied beings. And some of those souls get treated differently because they're in this body or that body. It's your privilege not to see race, because people who are in dark skin see race in so many ways, all the time, every day, they experience violent, violence they experience. So many. I lost my words, I get so emotional.

Maegan

That's ok, I wish everyone could see your face right now. Like, there's so much emotion here. So take your time, this feels really powerful.

Dena

Yeah. So until all the young Black children are educated in the same ways that young White children are educated, and until they're safe from all violence, we have to be able to see what's happening. And not seeing race is not that way. Bodies are treated differently.

Maegan

Thank you. Yeah. So if you have heard yourself in any way, shape, or form, say, I don't see race, I don't see color, you know, it's like, oh, in essence, like, we're all souls like, well, that's lovely. But I love how you said, yes, we're all souls, but we're all souls that exist in bodies. And our bodies look different. And the world makes decisions about how we're treated not based on our souls, but based on our bodies. And we have to own that we can't romanticize this. Right? So with love, if you've heard yourself say that in any way, especially specially in the therapy room, just take a step back, take a deep breath, and call Dena so she can so she help you. That's Thing Number one, you don't see race. Thing number two.

Dena

You feel uncomfortable talking about race and racism. So this is the thing White people do, they say I have a client who's Black, and then they whisper it right, we say it very softly, because we don't feel comfortable. We don't feel comfortable talking about the experiences of Black people. We don't feel comfortable talking about what's really happening. So when you don't feel comfortable, when you feel that defensiveness, anger or shame come up, it's a sign I need to do something with this. We ask our clients to do that all the time. Oh, you're feeling shame. Let's bring that into the light.

Maegan

And you know, what I was just thinking Dena is that there are probably a lot of therapists listening, probably myself included. Thinking about, you know, the last couple of years of my therapy practice where I've gotten much more comfortable having conversations about race and racism in my personal life. But I was still pretty scared to do it in the therapy room with a therapy client.

Dena

Yeah, it's hard. It's another jump. Right? Because we we think it's a little bit like talking about suicide. We think if I bring up oh, is this about race, then they're gonna think, Oh, well, maybe it wasn't, but now I suddenly see that it is right. or something's gonna happen that we don't get ,we don't know, we don't understand or we don't know how to control. And so we feel scared of it.

Maegan

Yeah. All right. So you don't see race, you don't see color, a good sign white supremacy culture is showing up in your practice. If you feel uncomfortable talking about race or racism with BIPOC clients in your practice, that's a good red flag for you. The third red flag. Ooh, this is a big one.

Dena

Yeah. You don't have any bipoc clients.

Maegan

Zero.

Dena

Zero or one, right, maybe somebody who's my token BIPOC, and then I can feel good about having somebody.

Maegan

Look at me...

Dena

Yeah, but what we know is that BIPOC folk in our country are trauma survivors. In fact, they live trauma every single day. And people who are trauma survivors we all know, can sense who's, who understands and who doesn't. They can sense who's safe and who isn't. And if you can't show up for them, they're not going to show up in your space, because it's simply not safe. If you can't create that safe space, if you can't hold that container for them, they won't show up.

Maegan

Okay. I feel like we could spend two more hours talking about that specifically, I won't, because we don't have the time. But that feels really important. And like a lot of people are feeling really called out right now. And that's okay. We're in this together.

Dena

Yep. In this together.

Maegan

What's the fourth way?

Dena

Yeah, you don't show up as you in the therapy room, right? We were talking about identity and how important it is. And we've all been, my school too, you don't show up in the therapy room, you're a blank slate, blah, blah, blah, it's not true. It is simply, just simply not true. I show up in the therapy room, in this body. And people see me in this body and they make lots of assumptions about who I am based on the ways that I present, the ways that I show up. And the more I authentically I can do that, the more likely it is that clients, BIPOC clients especially will respond to that in a very positive way. It's that mutual vulnerability, and we're taught not to do it. And yet, it's what our clients need. They need to know that we're safe, that we're going to show up with all of our foibles and, and life experience.

Maegan

Beautiful. Yeah, and you know, I'm a big believer that showing up as yourself is going to help you prevent burnout in your own life, too. I guess none of us are, none of us are benefiting from this system that teaches therapists that they can't show up in the room. None of us. In fact, I would say, and I know Dena, you and I've had this conversation before. But it just it serves the White man in power for us to be silent. You know, if if we if I as a White woman, I'm just showing up in the therapy room, handing out DSM diagnosis like candy and using all of the therapy models that I learned in grad school that were all created by White people and I'm not showing up as myself, and I'm not asking hard questions, I am actively perpetuating the system of power.

Dena

Yes.

Maegan

That I too am a victim of.

Dena

Yes.

Maegan

So like, what an act of revolution as a therapist to step into the room and say, you know what? Screw it. Yeah, no, no more of that. I'm showing up as myself with boundaries, of course, yes, of course, I'm going to talk about race and racism, I'm going to do this work in a way that feels good to me so that I don't burn out, so that I can help more people, so that I can challenge white supremacy. That's huge.

Dena

Yes, huge.

Maegan

Okay, way number five, white supremacy culture might be showing up?

Dena

Number five is you're not involved in the community beyond your therapy room. So it goes back to that personal is political. And we have an obligation when we know things to act and to act better. And I'm not saying that your job is to get out in the street and protest. I'm just saying your job is something, your lane is something, to help change the traumas that BIPOC folk are experiencing every single day. And we demonstrate our commitment to our clients through our actions, not just by showing up in the therapy room. And that's a big action when you're doing something. Just has to be one thing, doesn't have to be all the things.

Maegan

Right. You just have to start. Yeah. When starting is the hardest part.

Dena

It is.

Maegan

Always right?

Dena

It is but you're here and that's a good start.

Maegan

Yeah, I mean, if you're still listening to this conversation, thumbs up. Yeah, moving in the right direction. Okay, you have a little extra here that I had to keep in when you sent me your talking points, because it's just too good. So what's the bonus sixth way white supremacy culture might be showing up in your practice?.

Dena

This one's for you, Megan.

Maegan

Thank you Dena.

Dena

This one's pretty big. Number six is you hate Mondays, whatever your day or Monday is Tuesday's my Monday, whatever your Monday is, you dread it, and you don't look forward to it, because you're exhausted. So this is the intersection between white supremacy culture and capitalism, which is a system we all have to work with/into. And again, we could have hours of conversation about that. But in the meantime, it's important to pay attention to where your energy is and where it's depleted. Because burnout is real. I'm preaching to the choir now. And it means you won't have the energy to do this other hard work. That's really the point that I want to get at. When you're satisfied and happy and not burned out, you can do the hard work that we all need to do. White supremacy culture is really good at telling us don't talk to other people, stay separate, stay siloed, stay individual, and you have to work all the time so that we don't have energy to sit back and recognize what's really going on. And, you know, squash the patriarchy. So those are, that's my goal is that we're all rested and able to do our lane. So we have enough energy for it.

Maegan

Yeah, exhausted people can't fuel a revolution.

Dena

Nope we can't do any of that.

Maegan

Okay, Dena, we have to have another conversation later about capitalism.

Dena

I'm game. Awesome.

Maegan

All right. So in sum, five ways you might see white supremacy culture in your practice, think of these as red flags: you don't see race, you feel uncomfortable talking about race or racism with your clients, you don't have any BIPOC clients, or maybe just one token BIPOC client, you don't show up as you in the therapy room, you're not involved in the community beyond your therapy room, and you hate Mondays.

Dena

And you hate Mondays.

Maegan

These are really great red flags. Even if one of these red flags rings true for you, I want you to definitely download the document that Dena has created for us with more red flags to be on the lookout for and a bunch of resources to help you get started on your own anti-racism anti-oppressive journey as a therapist. So that's coming. We'll say more about that at the end of the conversation. But Dena, I know that you have five specific suggestions for the therapists listening who are ready to take some action. So five suggestions. Let's get started with number one.

Dena

Number one, educate yourself. And I think that this is a really, really good place to start. And this is only the very tip top of the iceberg which is melting because of global warming.

Maegan

Whomp-whomp.

Dena

The key thing to take away from this too, is that not to rely on your BIPOC clients to educate you. Just like my experience in therapy, BIPOC clients have an enough on their plates to not to have to educate you. It's your job to have an understanding of the overall concepts of what's going on in the world. When you have a client who comes in and says I'm Muslim, to understand a little bit about Islam, and what that means and what that might mean for their life. There's a ton of resources, there's no shortage right now with people talking about what it means to be filling X identity in this country. I'm gonna give you some today. And then there's a ton more resources on my handout that people can get for free. So that means reading, educating. Google is a great place right now, there's so much information out there.

Maegan

I love, I've heard you say before, the general rule, ask the internet.

Dena

Ask the internet, yep.

Maegan

Don't ask your BIPOC friend or client like ask the internet, the internet has the answer.

There's a YouTube video for that,

There's a YouTube video for that. Even better invest in doing this work with a professional like Dena, or there are so many people who are doing this work right now, who will guide you through this process in a structured way. Create a container for you to have big feelings and to ask hard questions. I just can't recommend that, I can't recommend that enough. I've done a little bit of both. I've done a little bit of self study. And that's been great. But I noticed that I fall off the wagon, you know, it took me forever to finish reading Me and White Supremacy because I would just get emotionally overwhelmed.

Dena

It's a hard book, yep.

Maegan

I would do like one section, and then I would just start avoiding it because it was so hard. And I've done the deepest work when I've paid someone to guide me through the process. So anyways, I just want to add that in because...

Dena

And it's that silo thing, you don't have to do it alone. And so many of our White families and our White colleagues aren't doing this work. And so it feels very lonely. It feels very isolating, and you feel a little crazy sometimes.

Maegan

That's a really good, we're on a little bit of a tangent now, but I think part of the reason that I stepped into paying someone to do the work was because, it was because as I was doing self study and kind of getting into this on my own, and trying unsuccessfully to have some of these conversations with my family of origin. I started getting really emotionally overwhelmed. Yeah, I mean, I did I started and same for colleagues, you know it, it did feel really lonely. I just, I'm just sitting with this because I think you're right. If we're not in community, if we're not having this conversation with people who can meet us with compassion and support and have the hard conversations will probably just like it, it will just fizzle out and we won't do the work.

Dena

Yeah. And we all, we're therapists, we know the value of paying somebody to be our shoulder to create space for us to have that container. All the things we do in therapy, we need it. And we need it for this work.

Maegan

Yeah. Okay. All right. Educate yourself in many different ways.

Dena

Yes, so many.

Maegan

What's the second thing we can do about white supremacy culture in our therapy businesses?

Dena

Yeah. My number two is dive deeply and fiercely into yourself and your own privilege. It goes back to that idea of how we show up in the world and who we are, how we show up in the therapy office. And to understand that white supremacy culture ends with each of us, each of us have a responsibility for ending it, for doing something different. And there are ways of doing this that don't put, like you said, don't put that responsibility back on the BIPOC people in your life. This has worked for white and white passing people. Because BIPOC folks are shouldering the burden of 500 years of genocidal history. And it's time.

Maegan

I'm just feeling this in my body, just like the guilt, the heaviness, the empathy it is, I mean, just I feel it in my body right now, how easy it is to get overwhelmed by the weight of this conversation. And then it comes back to the isolation like if I'm, if I didn't have you, if I didn't have another conversation with you on the books in a week, I would probably stop this interview and feel really heavy and bad. And then like, avoid.

Dena

Yeah.

Maegan

So I think, you can't, can't do this alone.

Dena

No.

Maegan

Great, Dena, gang. Number three, what can we do?

Dena

Practice believing your clients, when they tell you about racial experiences, it's really easy for White people to say that, Oh, that can't be the reason why, that's not a racial experience. Oh, that person must have been doing something wrong. And if somebody else was doing that, we would call that gaslighting because my experience is real and true and valid. And yet, we don't do that in a racial context. And if somebody did that to you, you'd be pissed. It would be hurtful. If somebody said, Oh, that sexist thing that happened to you wasn't because you were, you know, you're a woman, we all get that. And we need to see that for our clients and to be able to say, oh, was that race based? Was that something that you experienced because of your race? When we say things like, oh, they didn't mean it that way, gaslighting. And we need to find those instances in ourselves, and practice not doing that. Practice sitting with the discomfort of not pushing away race based experiences that are violent and horrible.

Maegan

Well, I've never heard anybody talk about it in terms of gaslighting, and I'm, I'm so shocked. This is the first time I'm hearing somebody say that because you're it, you're so right like that make that's exactly what that is.

Dena

Yeah.

Maegan

Making them doubt themselves, making them think they're crazy, or that it's their fault. Absolutely, that is gaslighting. So this feels like a really powerful call to action. You know, it maybe if you just walk away only doing one thing after this conversation, like just practice believing people.

Dena

Yes.

Maegan

Your clients, your colleagues. And I know we're talking a lot about the therapist client experience today. But I hear this conversation quite a bit in the in the business owner space to where a therapist of color will say, kind of talked about this at the beginning of the conversation, will say I've had a really hard time growing my business as a person of color. And then the White coach, or the White colleague will say, well, actually, you just haven't done X, Y and Z or you haven't done enough of this or you need to do more of that. And like that is gaslighting your colleagues. Believe them when they tell you that they are struggling as a result of their race.

Dena

Yes.

Maegan

Okay, that feels big. Thing number four.

Dena

Practice asking your clients about their racial experiences. So remember, when I said that what White people tend to do is they say Black really quietly and whisper it right? As if it's a bad word or something that we shouldn't say, we need to practice asking about it. We need to practice asking our clients to bring all of their identities fully into the room. And for them to be able to show up authentically. And we practice by talking about it. We practice by standing in front of the mirror and saying those words that feel hard or difficult. We practice by talking to our colleagues, and reading and learning. So practice, it's a big one.

Maegan

And remembering that practicing, you're not asking your client about their racial experience, or your colleague about their racial experience so they can educate you about what it's like to be a person of color in the therapy room or in the therapy business space. That's not the purpose for your asking. You're asking us an invitation to let them know that you want them to be their full self with you.

Dena

Yes.

Maegan

Which they'll only do if you in turn are your full self with them.

Dena

Absolutely.

Maegan

Okay. Thing number five we can do to combat white supremacy culture in our therapy practices Dena.

Dena

So I labeled this one representation is important. So representation in all areas. When I redesigned my website, I made sure that all of the pictures on my website were people of color. Without hesitation or a doubt, this is who I want people to feel comfortable seeing on my website and associated with my business. What's the language you use to describe your practice? Language is crucial. Who are the people that you're describing as your ideal client? How can you make it more inclusive? We're always value signaling. I'm value signaling I only value White people if all the pictures on my website are White people, and BIPOC clients see these things you may not because that's how white supremacy culture works. But BIPOC clients see them very clearly. And again, they know who to trust and who not to trust. And we're, we're not doing them any favors.

Maegan

I'm just sitting with that. It's this is also powerful. And I'm starting to think, coming back to the land acknowledgement piece. And I'm seeing more and more that people are putting in bold front and center on their websites, a land acknowledgement, but also I am affirming of these identities. I am using an anti-racist lens. Like, give us just like a five minute masterclass Dena, in what should we be leading with in our marketing? And how can we do that with integrity?

Dena

Yeah, that's a good question. Because I see a lot of those websites. I'm like, huh, but you don't really. Yeah, that's it's all fine and good, but it's the deeper level, like I might see your splashed across your page, I serve queers and, and see, nobody, no same sex couples represented in your pictures. And I'm going to go, eh but you don't really, or the way you talk about, or on your intake form. The there's two sexes you can choose from I'm either male or female, eh that doesn't speak to me, or asking about race specifically isn't included, or isn't important. Or the only people in your practice are White people. It's really a turnoff for folks like me, who are looking for somebody who understands a little bit deeper, and more about the practice. So language, language is important.

Maegan

Language is important. And it sounds like, the way I'm hearing you describe it is if you're going to put, if you're going to lead on your website with some statement about how inclusive or affirmative you are, you need to be able to back that up. Yeah, in many different ways. It's not just like, I love everyone. I love everyone. I'm affirming of everyone.

Dena

That's just like I don't see race.

Maegan

That's kind of just like, I don't see race. Yeah, that's what I'm, that's what I think that's what's standing out to me right now that like, how can you, how can you back it up?

Dena

Mm hmm.

Maegan

And in two ways, I'm hearing, are you backing it up with your marketing materials? You know, does the language on your website, the photos on your website, does it match who you are saying you you are in these statements? But also, and this is where I'm wanting your help a little bit, Dena? Do we need to be able to back up these statements with something even deeper? Here's the work that I've done to be able to serve these people in these in these groups of which I am not a member?

Dena

Yeah. So here, that was my thought, too. When you're talking about how do I market myself, is how do I put myself out there right, that being authentic. When I started putting on my website that I owned the white privilege that I have from my pale skin, one, I felt so much more authentic, I felt so much more like I can show up in these spaces. And people started responding to me very differently. Because I'm saying the words, I'm saying the words that so many people won't say, I know this exists, I know this impacts your life, and I'm doing my best to change that. And it's huge when I can show up authentically like that.

Maegan

And let's talk for a minute about land acknowledgments. If someone's interested in exploring that land acknowledgement and how they can learn about whose land they are living on and language they can use to, you know, write about that on their website. Do you have any places they can go to learn more about that process?

Dena

I do. And there's a really fantastic website. That's not right off the top of my head. I'll put that on, maybe we can put that in the comments.

Maegan

That's perfect. We'll put it on the on the resource list that yeah, the resource list.

Dena

Yeah. That that tells you who who did these lands belong to there's a map. There's a fantastic map on the website, which I can't remember the name of that we'll tell you.

Maegan

That's ok. We're totally putting you on the spot but adding it to the resource list is so helpful.

Dena

We will do that. And there's tons of good resources out there right now for how to write a land acknowledgement, how to think about land acknowledgments. We'll put those resources in there too, because it is really important to just remember, this is not our land. We came here as conquering genocidal, genocidal maniacs. Right?

Maegan

Right.

Dena

Not our land.

Maegan

That's really, really powerful. And I really appreciate the way that you teach us about this without shaming us. And well, let me just speak for myself here, because I don't actually know how our listeners are going to respond to this conversation. But I am responding with gratitude. Because as per us(ual), you challenged me to think about things in new ways, you challenged me to re-engage in my own anti-racism, anti-oppressive work as a business owner, as a therapist, and you do it in a way that makes me feel seen and supported. And not shamed, because shame shuts us down. We know that shame shuts us down, like no good comes from anyone from a place of shame. And I'm so grateful to you for having this conversation with me today, Dena in a way that has made me feel safe and supported, and challenged. And again, I have so much gratitude for the amount of labor that you have put into preparing for this conversation. I've seen an outline of the handout that Dena is creating for all of our listeners to to get for free. If you've listened this far in the conversation, know that underneath Dena's interview, on the interview page, where you will go to listen to this conversation will be a little opt-in, where you can sign up to get the resource list, there are more red flags to look out for to see if white supremacy culture is showing up in your therapy practice. There are more suggestions for what you can do can do to dismantle white supremacy culture in your therapy practice. And there are so many resources, movies, documentaries, books, websites, how to write a land acknowledgement. This is incredible. As Dena's business coach, I am going to encourage you to turn this into something that you charge people for because you have put so much time and effort into this. And I also want people to know that later this year, Dena will be launching new consulting programs and group offerings, and one on one offerings for therapists who are ready to dig in to this work or are ready to make a difference. And I just cannot speak highly enough of Dena's integrity, and brilliance and kindness. And I just would absolutely feel so safe doing this hard work with Dena and Dena, I'm so grateful that you joined us today to share everything that you shared. Thank you.

Dena

Thank you, Megan. I appreciate it. And I think the last thing to leave people with is that they don't have to do this work alone. This is hard. Just gonna say that again. It's emotional. It's difficult. Don't do it alone. Whether that's with me or somebody else you trust. Get together, talk to people.

Maegan

Yeah. Yeah, thank you for reminding us of that. Don't do it alone. If you're anything like me, you'll try to do it alone. And then you'll just stop doing it because you will be ashamed and depressed and scared. And what do we do as humans? We avoid what feels challenging, and I own that that is, that is like a testament to my privilege as a White woman that I can just stop doing the work and go about my life and nothing changes for me. And being in community and having accountability, I can't I can't do this work without it. And yeah, I just really appreciate you naming that, Dena.

Dena

Thanks Maegan.

Maegan

So thank you for being here today again.

Dena

Thanks Maegan.

Maegan

 I am so happy that you made it to the end of this important conversation. I know how easy it is to click away when we are trying to learn about white supremacy, anti-oppression. It's heavy stuff, and it triggers lots of feelings, but you? you made it all the way to the end, and I am grateful to you for listening all the way through. And now it is time to implement the work Atiq shared with us in this conversation.

If you find yourself wishing that you had a guide or a mentor to help shepherd you through this process of making your business anti-oppressive, Atiq is here to support you and you can learn all about them and the work that they are doing in the world at their website atiqshomar.com. That's A-T-I-Q-S-H-O-M-A-R.com.

Of course, we'll put all of Atiq's links in the show notes for easy access. And if you loved this conversation, I would love it if you shared it with a few people that you love. Let's just spread the love, make the world a better place, one business owner at a time. You can text them the link to this episode, and then you can have a buddy to talk about it with in real time.

Thank you so much for listening, for sharing. I'm really glad that you're here. And I can't wait to connect with you again next week on the Deeply Rested Podcast.