7 Lessons to Help Keep Your Power of Positive Intention When You (or Your Country) Are Attacked

Issue 156 — January 10, 2021

Were you eager to leave 2020 behind?

Surprise. The first week in this brave new year has tried our souls even more than the year we thought we left behind. Whoever said the past is never really past knew what she was talking about.

It’s apparently not enough that we are still battling a raging global coronavirus pandemic that’s wreaking havoc on our health and disrupting almost everything about our lives.

It’s not enough that small businesses are being forced to close at an astounding rate. Or that women have lost or left four times as many jobs as men, and that women of color are hardest hit because they have held the frontline jobs most vulnerable to the shut down.

It’s not enough that rampant racism continues too often to be unpunished despite the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement and mass demonstrations across the world. As newly elected member of Congress Cori Bush (D-MO) wrote in the Washington Post op ed: “This is the America that Black people know.” Now more of America knows.

Last week, we witnessed a high (low?) water mark that brought together the racism, sexism, homophobia, and antisemitism, anti-democratic rioters with some COVID super spreader events by mask-resisters thrown in to boot.

Even as we welcomed a new year with the feathers of hope, we saw the greatest assault on our democracy since the Civil War. Armed white supremacist terrorists — call thugs what they are — invaded the U.S. Capitol (often reverentially referred to as “The People’s House”) in an attempted coup. Call that what it is too.

[This photo of Congressional staff calmly protecting the presidential elector ballots by taking them to a safe place while the Capitol was under siege by terrorists is very moving. I doubt these young women had any expectation when they took those jobs that they would stand between a bunch of marauding thugs and the sacred papers representing something so fundamental to our democracy. HT to them for having the presence of mind and all who made sure the votes were protected. Read here about the heroic actions of these Senate aides.]

I’m going to speak some raw truth here, from experience.

I have walked the Capitol steps, entered those doors, and walked those marble hallways many times as a citizen to try to persuade legislators to support or oppose policies I believed in. I’ve won some and lost some hard-fought battles, and I’ve got the virtual scars to prove it. But never in my most passionate dreams would I have thought of breaking or destroying Federal property or breaking and entering offices to get my way.

You see, my grandparents fled their countries of origin and came to America to escape exactly the kind of lawless, violent bigots who stormed the Capitol on January 6, the very day our country was supposed to model for the world how to have a peaceful transition of power even after a bitterly fought election.

What we witnessed at the Capitol is primarily about white male hegemony and their fear of losing it.

And seeing these white supremacist terrorists violating all norms of civil behavior, egged on by demagogues — some of whom hold the public trust of elected office — triggers memories for me; I had to deal with essentially the same angry people, or at least the same mindset of privilege to abrogate civility and foment violence, when I was president of Planned Parenthood affiliates and later its national organization. I have personally been the target of vandalism, death threats in Nazi language, invasions of my workplace, picketing of my home, and more, usually without adequate police protection.

I’m telling you that not to get sympathy but to share ways I learned to stay strong under attack and not be victimized.

These are some of the most important leadership lessons I learned from those experiences. I hope they will help anyone reading this who feels traumatized by the events of the past week.

1. Racists, sexists, antisemites, anti-LGBTQ beliefs are joined at the head. There is always an underbelly of this in American society. Those who say “this is not who we are” would be better served to say “this is not who we aspire to be.” Know this reality and that you are never going to get everyone under the same tent. The harder you fight them, the more dug in the hard core will get. Work with the persuasible majority.
2. We are in for a time calling for the utmost courage and steely determination to forge ahead with the legitimate work of democracy regardless of the opposition to it. It’s a never-ending process. Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.
3. We have a huge opportunity now. It is likely that the extremism laid bare in this moment will foster a political and social reset to greater respect for the institutions designed to protect freedom and justice and the gender and racial equality that Take The Lead works for every day.
4. Do not retreat to secrecy or put your head down to avoid being noticed because that implies weakness and fear rather than strong leadership. Plus they will find you and target you anyway. You are better served to be out in the open where your friends will support you.
5. Remember who you are and what your purpose is. Claim your values and wear them proudly.
6. Don’t let the adversary take up residence in your head. Their hatred and venom is their problem. You stay focused on the good you are doing in the world. Save your energy for what you are doing to preserve your sense of positive intentions.
7. Whether you are formally a leader or leading from whatever chair you sit in, deliver messages that uplift people to their higher values and help them feel a part of the effort to overcome the hatreds and divisions that have been laid bare.

I promise you: This is the opportunity for a major reset. Now is the time for bold statements and initiatives to bring people together. Now is the time to muster the will to create a more civil and caring union, to heal the racial divides, to push the teetering social fulcrum toward greater gender and racial justice.

Now is the time to believe the evidence that women are better leaders in crises, and to put women at the center of the economic recovery.

Thank you Minda Harts, author of The Memo, for your powerful leadership for racial and gender equality. I look forward to your Power to Change webinar on 1/12, facilitated by Black Women’s Collaborative founder Felicia Davis, Leadership Brand Architect and Take The Lead Leadership Ambassador.

Register here — if you can’t attend, register anyway and we’ll send you the link afterward.

[Read more about Melinda Gates’ company Pivotal Ventures here.]

I stand in hope and positive intention with Melinda Gates and Stacey Abrams for a better, kinder, more equitable future for all Americans.

[Stacey Abrams’ leadership was instrumental in flipping Georgia’s Senate seats blue.]

GLORIA FELDT is the Cofounder and President of Take The Lead, a motivational speaker and expert women’s leadership developer for companies that want to build gender balance, and a bestselling author of four books, most recently No Excuses: 9 Ways Women Can Change How We Think About Power. Former President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, she teaches “Women, Power, and Leadership” at Arizona State University and is a frequent media commentator. Learn more at www.gloriafeldt.com and www.taketheleadwomen.com. Tweet Gloria Feldt.