My DEI Story By Leah Vaughan

“I have a moral right to resist either through violence or civil disobedience. You better pray I choose the latter.” ~ James Farmer, Jr. - The Great Debaters

I am engaging the following body of work as a Black, cisgender, able-bodied woman, born and reared in a military household (United States Air Force), educated at an HBCU (Historical Black College and University), life partner of a brilliant Black man, and the mother of three amazing Black daughters.

I am a descendant of enslaved Africans and Indigenous people; however, I do not know my tribes. My purpose for being here is to continue my commitment to creating more open, honest, and inclusive space for Black, Brown, Indigenous and People of Color. Operations and Administration were my profession. However, after losing my job at the end of 2020, I have found my passion for equity and inclusion pulling me toward an alignment of my professional skills and personal passions.

As a Black woman, I know I bring up all kinds of feelings in people with White and White-passing privilege. Historically, life has formed in our bodies, nations have nursed at our breasts, and justice has been balanced on our shoulders. And yet I am expected to remain poised while experiencing misogynoir (misogynoir - the particular brand of hatred directed at a Black woman in American visual and popular culture - Moya Bailey), being gaslit (gaslight/gaslit - specific type of manipulation where the manipulator is trying to get someone else (or a group of people) to question their own reality, memory or perceptions) and having my skills consistently manipulated for corporate gain. I have been described as assertive, civic-minded, commanding, resourceful and strategic; however, I have been treated as less intelligent, less experienced than my White counterparts. I have had more education and experience, but have been supervised by someone younger, with less education and less experience. I am expected to not feel entitled to an explanation nor to demand to be acknowledged. I am not to demand an apology. And I am definitely not to band together with other Black women and women of color in defense of one another. I am a member of multiple marginalized communities. Choosing to know nothing about me makes it easier for those who do not look like me to hold so many assumptions and expectations for me, who I should be and why.

This has been my professional journey for as long as I can remember, but it began long before I knew or understood what it meant to be a professional. I can recall as early as third grade knowing how unacceptable I was when I was being myself, but how much better I could be if I would just…. So many contradictions creating such confusion at such an early age. And not having the words outside of “I do not understand.” or “That is not fair.” No child should feel the way I felt, confused and alone. That confusion and aloneness permeated my being. And even with loving, supportive parents, an affluent upbringing and excellent education, I still found myself in professional spaces fixing my words and centering White comfort over my mental, physical and emotional well-being, because that is how I was told I would stand out, get ahead and find success. The expectations of assimilation were woven into every environment and ate away at my being, eroding my most authentic, whole self every day for the last 20 years - my diction, my hair, my professional attire…hell -- my presence – viewable, but not audible. “It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness, an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.” ~ W.E.B. Du Bois - The Souls of Black Folks - I was complicit in being their acceptable Negro.

My DEI journey is one of personal healing and advocacy. I am fighting to work through my trauma as a Black professional woman all while engaging my truths. This work can only be done when I commit to bringing my whole self into every experience. By nature, I am a disruptor and a connector. I am committed to breaking down barriers and building up communities. So, I stand here, completely exposed and vulnerable in the hope that as you read only a fraction of my DEI journey, that you also know that it is not unique to me. It is the story of so many professional women of color. And though I am uncertain of what may come next, I trust the mystery of my life, am grateful for the shift and excited about my future.