Guest Blog: (Part 1) Journey to Allyship: How Life Experiences Helped Me Overcome Bias and Bigotry

This is the first blog in a 3-part series.

As I write this, I find myself halfway through my fiftieth trip around the sun.. The year of turning fifty is a reflective time for many people, and I know I am not unique in my introspection. The past three decades -- the full span of my adult life -- have left me feeling little connection to where I was born and raised and to who I was during that time. In truth, I spent my first twenty years NOT growing into the man I was meant to be.

So, how does one travel from a dorm room at Ole Miss, festooned with a five-foot Confederate flag, to a multicultural neighborhood in Charlotte, selected in part because of its diversity of schools that will well-serve your bi-racial (Black and White) child? For some of us born in Generation X and earlier, that’s a long, complicated trip.